


How To Fall

by FortinbrasFTW



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Canon Typical Violence, Depowered Lucifer, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Isolation, M/M, Theology, UA - universe alteration, Wilderness, Wings, which should totally be everyone's new thing instead of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-04
Updated: 2013-07-04
Packaged: 2017-12-07 10:31:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 41,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/747501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FortinbrasFTW/pseuds/FortinbrasFTW
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>'“I’ve been falling for some time, through darkness, and pain, and fire. And then I saw you, shining through the shadows, and I knew you would catch me one day. But you didn’t, I fell right past you, further than I ever imagined I could, and now I wonder if I’ve finally hit the ground.”'</i>
</p><p>When a spell goes wrong Sam ends up stranded in the north Canadian wilderness with nothing to do but bunker down and wait for rescue, which wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the broken angel he's accidentally brought along for the ride.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Listen to the Soundtrack: [[HERE]](http://8tracks.com/fortinbrasftw/how-to-fall)  
> 
> 
> Check out the graphic: [[HERE]](http://fortinbrasftw.tumblr.com/post/54641148056/how-to-fall-read-soundtrack-rating-m)  
> 
> 
>  
> 
> [](http://imgur.com/4NIalfn)  
>   
> 
> 
> My BETA for this story is the lovely Clara 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “I’m sorry you were not truly loved and that it made you cruel.”  
> — Warsan Shire

_Cold--_

Sam gasps. His eyes fly open all at once and the darkness pours in. 

It hurts. So he screams. 

The sound echoes, dull and wasted against some vast space and wind too strong to do much else besides smother.

But none of that registers, none of it matters, not while his stomach is trying to escape up out his throat while his head turns inside out to get a better look at just what the fuck is happening. But by some miracle his insides don’t become outsides, so he simply falls forward under the relief of his guts still being mostly up to par with schematics.

He hits the snow all at once as the pain crawls up under his skull, burrowing deep and sharp. It’s changing, shifting into something that has decided it’s stuck with his body like this so it might as well make the best of it.

But something’s wrong, something icy and wet up past his knees, something that’s similar to the sharp cold slapping against his face in the dark - and he’s just realizing that it really is dark. Night dark - not eyes screwed shut dark, or some spell netherworld dark. Normal dark. And that’s what’s wet and wrong and all around him... 

Snow.

It’s up to his thighs, thick and freezing. And that’s not all: there’s wind ripping through his hair, biting over his face and his ears. There’s still pain lacing up under his limbs like something’s trying to do embroidery with his skin, but another sense is replacing it, steadily as the dull solid thud of cold presses patiently into him. It’s the most obvious in that his fingers are going numb, dumbly clutching into the icy snow under them.

He focuses on that. The cold. It’s better than everything else even if it makes no goddamn sense at all. 

He clings to it and manages to take one hard breath through his nose as he bites down on the pain. And then another. Then another. And okay… it’s a start, good enough to try and think, at least a bit. But it’s not that hard to let the thoughts spill is, starting with the screaming one: _where the fuck am I?_

Sam makes himself look, focus as the lingering lines of pain trace up the spread webs of his nerves.

He opens his eyes again.

Snow. 

Lots of snow.

And dark. 

Night. Cold. Snow. Lots of snow. 

Shit.

He’s got to look exactly where he doesn’t want to. He know’s that, and the pain’s not so bad now. His eyes can actually make sense of things two feet in front of them as they adjust slowly to the dark. So he swallows. And he looks.

It’s blessedly underwhelming. The slice on his arm appears just as it should, one clean red line that looks more like ink in the darkness. 

So there’s that…

He makes himself focus, evaluate, break down the pain in the practiced way he always did: what hurt where? What hurt how? Was it the pen knives in your lungs post-curse feeling, or the blinding white post-smiting brain stinging, or just the good old bone deep smashed against a wall four times too many aching? He can managed that at least, can’t he? Pain’s simple. Pain’s familiar. So he focuses.

The nasty under the skin transporter-gone-wrong feeling’s _definitely_ of the magical variety… but nothing even close to recognizable and he’s damn glad it does’t seem to want to stick around long enough to get a name. Already he feels it easing out of him and into the snow-laden air. Which leaves the rest…

His arm does hurt. A bit. But just as it should, dull, simple post-cut ache. And there’s another hurt, sharp and silencing, but he’s already recognizing that as the cold from the snow working it’s way into his limbs.

So, still in one piece, it seems…

Okay. That’s him. Time for everything else. He squints against the whipping wind and heavy darkness. It’s not easy to see, but that’s getting better now, a bit, at least enough that shapes are coming out of the shadows. Tall ones.

_Trees._ It clicks and suddenly things seem to make a bit more sense.

The trees are sparse and large, pine, and all as deep in the drifts as he is. There are taller, fainter shadows in the distance. Mountains, maybe. 

And jesus christ, _where the hell is he?_

He has to try and move. The pain is finally becoming distant enough to think about it, at least. He stands, and— 

_Shitshitshit…_

It’s too damn soon, his body instantly screaming at him to cut it the fuck out. He pushes that aside because he’s long since perfected the art of that sort of thing, and not at all because fear and adrenaline are starting to eclipse agony with each passing second.

"DEAN!" He yells.

The wind rips against him all the harder, voice hardly anything at all, caught like a bit of paper and tossed up into the sky, useless and lost.

But he’s not thinking about that.

"BOBBY!” 

The wind knocks his own voice playfully back in his face. 

He tries to ignore the weight settling in his throat, swallowing hard before trying again.

“CAS! DEAN!”

Nothing.

Not even an echo.

Sam lets one hand run up into his hair, clutching tight as if that can hold the frankly overwhelming panic rising up in him at bay. He swallows and turns to look towards the trees again, because there’s not much else to do. That’s when he sees it.

A shape. It’s bulky and dark, in a pile in the snow a few meters off, and through the snow and the dark he can hardly see, but it’s obvious in an instant what it is. 

A body. A human shaped body.

“HEY!” 

The desperation of the call falls out before he can catch it, but he doesn’t let himself notice because he's surging through the snow before he has time to remember the pain still haunting up under his skin.

In any case moving seems to make it better. Or maybe getting closer to whatever’s lying in the snow makes it better. He can’t tell.

Whatever it is, whoever it is, it definitely is not moving. Sam’s hair's already half soaked, half frozen as he shoves it out of his face to try and see, but his eyes are getting better now, good enough to see a heavy streak of black over the snow that can only be blood, making his stomach sink tightly under him. 

He’s moving faster now, struggling towards it against the weight of the snow stuck to his flannel, and he should yell out again but there’s some stupid tightness closing his throat and he can’t seem to get there, so he just keeps going, shoving the snow aside and reaching out with stretched fingers.

He only realizes how numb his hands have gone when they finally catch fabric and he hardly feels it at all. But that doesn’t stop him from gripping tight and pulling. Hard. 

The weight resists, then rolls, unconscious and heavy.

Sam releases his grip very, very quickly. 

He lets go, because it’s hard not to when falling backwards in a panicked scramble to get as far away as is humanly possible within two seconds, staring in wide eyed shock while terror gives your throat a good meaty squeeze, because he understands, now. The slumped figure bleeding out in the snow snaps all the jagged bits right into place. 

He might not know where he is, but he knows why, and worst of all he knows how and who.

\-----

“And if it doesn't work?" Dean paces back and forth over Bobby’s carpet as if he fully intends to wear right through it.

"Dean," Sam sighs, leaning heavily on the table, "We've been over this a thousand times. We have to try, it's all we can do."

And jesus christ, it really was closing in on a thousand, if the scattered remains of two weeks worth of fast food wrappers and all night research spread as far as the eye could see were anything to go by.

"Yeah, well, and I'm gonna have to ask a thousand times more till we get an answer within ten fucking miles of acceptable!” Dean yells, slamming his beer down on the cluttered desk and turning to Cas who stands silent towards the back of the room.

Cas looks tired. Sam notices, even if it seems like Dean doesn’t - not real exhaustion, but the kind of tired Dean never seems to see, the subtle weariness he always seems to take on after watching Dean bang his head against reality as if he thinks it will break under enough force.

"As I have told you, I cannot be certain." Cas’ eyebrows make that small concerned line in his forehead as he answers.

Sam groans. They’ve been over it for days, weeks - ever since they found the tome in the coven’s lair. Bobby and Cas had spent all hours with the damn thing, and now they were here, _finally_ here, and there was only one last obstacle to get by, even if it was a particularly stubborn one...

Sam stands, “We're done talking about it. We've been talking about it since Maine. There’s nothing left to say. It's what we have, and we have to take that and run with it. We’ve got to run with something, anything.”

"Is that right?” Dean turns on him, “So we're just gonna go ahead and chuck all our well earned caution out the fucking window?"

"Dean," Sam insists, trying his best to stay calm, "We've waited too long already… How many people have died since we found this thing? How much closer is Zachariah getting, is Meg getting? And all the while we sit here weighing consequences like they even come close to measuring up.”

"He's right son," Bobby says quietly from behind the desk, staring down at his knitted hands, "I don't like it no more than you do, but we've been over it frontwards backwards and sideways, ain't gettin any clearer. And I’m not saying it’s any kind of crystal, but I think murky’s close as we get.”

Dean shuts his eyes, “I know, alright... I know."

Castiel steps closer, "We are running out of time, Dean. Lucifer is growing stronger each day. You saw what could happen if we do not succeed-“

"I know!" Dean snaps suddenly, "Jesus, I said I know,”

Castiel goes quiet, waiting, knowing there's more.

"Just… let's just go over it once more. Alright? Can we do that at least?” Dean asks, tone biting but expression pleading, edging into vulnerability.

Sam sighs, but he knows they're close now, closer than they have been for weeks. He sinks back into Bobby's moldy smelling sofa and runs a hand through his hair, "From what we can figure, it appears the spell was designed to eliminate an angel's abilities, to force a fall as it were."

"Yeah, angel trap door," Dean mutters, “Or?”

"Or…" Sam continues with a deep breath, “It eliminates the space between an angel and a vessel instantaneously."

"Like a freaking body snatcher's homing device,"

“Maybe…” Sam answers.

Dean snorts as if he knows exactly what to make of that and takes the pacing up a notch, “I still don’t get what makes this so muddled - I mean, is it just me, or are those two pretty fucking black and white results?"

"The language is… enigmatic.” Cas chimes in, "It seems to be a 'made flesh' curse - and I cannot be certain as to whether that indicates the ability to bring a vessel and an angel into the same space as a means for an angel to quickly locate their vessel, or whether it destroys any angelic abilities in the same manner as a fall.”

Bobby leans forward and looks into the pages spread out over the desk, "What it comes down to is we either end up with an angel who doesn't have enough juice to win a fiddle contest much less play apocalypse, or we get the devil ripping up my upholstery."

"And it's all set, ready to go?" Dean asks.

"Just about," Bobby sighs, "Not that it was any Sunday picnic - but Cas thinks we've got everything we need, except…"

"The blood of the vessel," Sam says.

Dean's face hardens, "I still say it should be me."

"No, Dean," Sam insists, "We've been over this - Michael's not the immediate problem."

"Sure is doing a convincing job acting like it,“

"Even so, we have to go for Lucifer. If we can drain his mojo this will all be over. Michael can do whatever he wants with him and he won't be able to put up enough of a fight to damage anything in the mean time. Sure, team Heaven's Wrath might be a bit pissed about losing their bets on a prize fight but still--"

"And what if it goes the other way?" Dean says roughly, "What if instead of this too-good-to-be-true-basement-hoodoo doesn't zap the devil into some useless bastard but instead has us dying the carpet all kinds of pretty new colors?”

Sam swallows, “If he comes here, we'll deal with it. I'd still have to say yes to him and you know I won't."

Dean groans and sits down rubbing his hands into his eyes.

"We’re really gonna have to do this, aren’t we?” He says finally, staring down at the floorboards under his boots as if they’ve personal betrayed him.

Castiel steps up behind him, "I will be prepared to take you all away from here the instant it seems as if it has gone wrong."

Dean swallows and shakes his head. He looks up into Sam's face.

"Are you sure about this, Sammy?"

Sam stares back, "No… but it's the best we've got."

"Tell you what," Dean says leaning back as the chair creaks, "When Chuck puts out New Testament 2.0 - don't let him use that as the subtitle."

"Alright, ladies," Bobby says standing, "Let's get this done before I realize how fucking stupid we all are for even trying."

"Sam," Castiel says sternly, "If we are truly to move forward, you must understand, I have no means of knowing with any certainly what might happen if we do this."

Dean lets out a groan but Sam tries to ignore it, that and the way Cas' eyes are drilling into him, and the way Bobby's are doing anything but.

He swallows once, steps forward and rolls up his sleeve.

\----

Lucifer doesn't move. 

There’s no denying it’s him. Even in the dark, and the snow, and the pretty atypical unconsciousness. There’s no denying it. It’s the same square jaw, solid weight, short messed blond hair as unkempt as his stubble, the olive tee and grey-green over shirt and those innocently lame dad jeans.

Sam’s heart’s still thudding loud enough to feel, but as he watches absolute nothing happen and realizes that he isn’t actually pinned down with all the force of angelic might, it starts to slow and steady into something normal. Well, ‘normal’ might be a bit relative…

He loosens his grip on his knife at his hip and finally he lets himself move closer.

Lucifer remains still, resting supine where Sam’s pulled him over. Well, 'resting' doesn't seem exactly accurate… the word would suggest some sort of calm respite, and the scene suggests anything but. It doesn’t look right what with the clothes and everything. More like something from a plane crash scene, something strewn, tossed aside with violence. And the blood pretty much does nothing but add to that. There's a cut across his forehead. Sam glances up to a tree just behind him. He might have hit it when… when what?

He remembers Bobby saying the words, voice low and rasping easily over the Latin, Cas standing at the ready behind them, a hand on each his and Dean's shoulder. He remembers running the blade over his arm. He remembers hearing the first drop hit the alter and then the whole room seemed to collapse and expand all at once. He'd felt Cas' hand tugged from his shoulder and he'd felt his hand grasp again only to miss, he’d heard Dean yell, smelled fire and ash and then nothing, nothing but white and cold and the pain ripping his skull in half.

And now…. now…

Sam looks around again, as if anything has changed and of course it hasn’t. Snow, trees, dark.

Where the hell is he?

He doesn't want to look at him again. There’s something so wrong about it. But he forces himself.

Lucifer is still there, fallen in the snow. His face looks calm, what he can see in the darkness at least, it might seem as though he were sleeping, if his arms and legs weren't sprawled in disarray.

Sam swallows and, before he can change his mind, he reaches out and pushes two fingers against his neck. It's warm, so warm he feels his fingers come back to life with a tingling pain, but he ignores it and pushes deeper, feeling for a pulse. It's there, but he’s realizing all at once he doesn't know if that's good or bad. Do angels have pulses?

Sam’s body shivers hard without asking permission and he realizes for the first time in over a year Lucifer is the least of his problems. He stands up and squints against the dark.

The snow's actually thinning, and as he looks up he can see the cloud cover shifting past the moon, shedding just that much more light into the world.

He can see now that there's a vast flat expanse of snow off in front of him, a lake probably, frozen and hidden under the white. Squinting, his eyes trail along what he guesses to be the shore, over the gentle curves of hidden rocks, the tall dark lines of pines, and something else, something not quite right with the rest of it.

He drags himself through the snow to try and see more clearly, squinting hard and feeling his chest surge gratefully when the clouds give just a bit more and the moonlight reflects off something on whatever it is.

Glass- he realizes all at once. Windows.

He can see it now - it’s geometric, obvious against the natural curves of everything else. It’s a house - a structure. Something. And that’s good enough. It’s great. It’s a fucking miracle.

His legs are truly going numb now, ears starting to thud painfully and he hasn't been able to feel his hands for a while. It’s sinking in that he’s in trouble here, and not the familiar kind, something worse and definite and growing all the more real each second. He can feel his chest starting to shake and knows it’s only a matter of time before he’s well and truly fucked.

The house is a ways off, almost half way around the lake. He has to move. Now.

Sam turned towards the structure, then stops. He looks back over his shoulder.

Despite the flurry, he can still make out the dark figure lying prone behind him. There's that vaguely familiar blond hair, dark on one side from blood, partially obscured by snow. One hand seems to reach, unmoving, in his direction, fingers curled dumbly against the cold.

Sam doesn't let himself think about that, thinking isn't helping. It's past that now. He can feel the tremors starting all up and down his body, hear his muscles begging him to slow down, to just stop and sleep, and he knows what that means. Soon enough it will be too late.

Turning back towards the cabin, he takes one step, and stops.

"Shit." He swears, turning back again, "Shit, shit, _shit_.”

His fingers, stiff with frost, grip the fabric of Lucifer's overshirt, trying to gain purchase. He's heavy, but at least he's warm. Sam breathes harder and tries to lift him higher, gasping out against the cold. 

With a steadying breath, he attempts to take a step and falls promptly through the deep of the snow.

Sam coughs out a mouthful of snow and manages to get up again. This time he pulls the unconscious body up sideways, looping one arm around Lucifer's chest, using the other to tug him firmly by the shoulders. He takes a step. He doesn’t fall, so he takes another.

After what feels like an hour he can only vaguely remember what it was like to feel most of your body. He doesn’t stop, but it’s not a conscious choice. It’s the simple fact that there’s absolutely no other option. There’s nothing but one step, and another, and another. It’s either that or the cold. 

He doesn't look back. He hardly even looks up. Each time he does the building seems further than it did before, so he shuts his eyes. It's easier that way. He doesn't think about the weight of the snow or how he can't feel his face any longer. He grips his hands against the warmth of the body against his, that's all it is, warm. That's all it's going to be.

His arm tightens, pulling the weight of it closer. He keeps going, and finally, _finally_ he’s there.

It's a house - more of a cabin really, well, more of a shack if he's being entirely honest. If he’d been more than half conscious he might have thought for two seconds before shouldering the door open. But he isn’t, so he doesn’t and the thing isn’t even locked and falls open easily. Sam pushes his way in and shuts the winter out behind them.

He drops the body unceremoniously onto the floor, hands scrambling at his pockets. His fingers close around his lighter and he flicks it on. The little flame lights up the cabin, dull orange with long tall shadows. It’s simple, bare bones. He doesn’t take much time to look around after catching sight of the wood stove against the center of the far wall with the neat stack of firewood beside it. 

Sam falls towards the thing all at once, knees hitting the wooden floor in a way that definitely would hurt it he could still feel anything. His hands are so numb he can hardly get them to work but after a few tries he gets the stove door open and he manages to get some logs into a decent pile inside. He knows there must be paper and kindling but there’s no time to look for it, his chest is still shuddering hard and now that the warmth of another body against his is gone his teeth are starting to chatter and he knows what that means. 

He has to hurry. 

His hands fly back to his pockets tugging out the little kerosene bottle that’s always there, dumping it onto the logs, and shoving his lighter in after.

The stove bursts into life with such ferocity that Sam has to fall back in order to ensure the sanctity of his eyebrows but the heat of it feels alive against his face and he finally lets himself breathe out in relief. He waits one minute, maybe two, and when he’s sure the logs are alive he shuts the door and falls onto his back on the floor.

He lies there, listening with his eyes pressed shut as the fire cracks and snaps in the stove. 

He’s still numb, but through it there’s a small sensation against his hip, something familiar.

In a second he's bolt upright, snatching at his pocket and pulling out the phone as it buzzes under his fingers. He looks desperately towards the service indicator - one bar, flicking in and out as he moves and then the damp weight of it is against his face--

“Dean?!”

"Sam!" Dean's voice filters through the wavering connection.

"Yeah," Sam gasps, throat still raw from exertion, but there at least, "Yeah it's me."

"What the hell happened?!”

“I- I don't know," Sam shuts his eyes tight, "Something went wrong,"

"Yeah, no shit, something went wrong. Are you alright?"

"I think so… cold, but I think I'm okay. Where am I?"

"Bobby pulled up your phone's GPS once you popped out of here but it's been fuzzy, something’s interfering and making it hard to know exactly. It doesn't make sense, Sam."

“ _Where_ am I?" Sam repeats carefully.

He hears Dean swallow through the phone, "Canada, north… You're not close Sam, we can’t even be exactly sure where.”

"I don't care," Sam grits, "Get me out of here."

Dean pauses and Sam knows that silence. He can almost see Dean’s expression twist with the weight of finding the right words.

"What? Dean, tell me."

"Cas says he can't get you. He says something's wrong."

Sam shuts his eyes tighter.

"But we're coming, okay, you hear me Sam?" Dean says, voice hardening, "We're coming to get you."

Sam's phone beeps and he realizes with a sudden tight wretch it’s the low battery.

"Dean,” Sam says, hating how terrified he sounds but fuck it, he is terrified, “Dean, the phone's going to die,"

"It's alright," Dean says in that voice Sam knows he uses when he’s trying to convince himself it is, “We’ve got a pretty good idea where you are - you just have to stay there and wait for us to get you. We’ll find you.”

"I can't," Sam insists, "There's nothing here, Dean, I have to get somewhere, I--"

"There's nowhere to go!" Dean's voice suddenly shouts, "I know it's bad Sam, but there's nowhere else.”

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"Look, we can see where you are, at least the area, and it's… you’re out there Sammy, you're way out there. I don't know what happened but you can't move. There's nothing for miles, and if you get lost and your phone is dead, I don't know if Cas will be able--"

"Alright," Sam says, cutting him off before the sick feeling in his stomach gets any worse, "Alright, I'll wait. I found a place - I’ll wait.”

He hates the next question but it comes anyways.

"How long?"

Dean pauses.

Sam's phone beeps again.

"Dean! How long? The battery—“

"A month or two, alright!” Dean yells finally, "I don't know Sam - maybe more."

Sam swears. His stupid shoulders have started shaking again.

"But we're coming, don't you think for a second that we're not. You just have to hold on."

Sam clenches his fists against the phone and tries to breathe. He lets himself look over across the floor to the slackened body by the door.

"Dean... there's something else."

"What—“

The phone dies.

Sam doesn’t move.

His eyes are locked on the wooden floor. His numb fingers keep the phone tight against his face, cold, and a little damp.

He can feel the warmth of the fire against his cheek, aching the heat back into his body. His clothes feel damp and clammy against him, but he doesn’t care. His whole body hurts, screams, hates him more than he probably knows right now. 

After a moment, maybe more than one, Sam lets his hand fall back to his side and drops the phone down to the floor. He stares at it for a long time and then lowers himself to the floorboards as well.

He hits the ground harder than he meant to, the smooth wood actually feeling almost warm under the cold of his cheek. He stares without really looking at anything as his eyelids push heavily down into a half shut haze. 

The orange light and long black shadows battle gentle across the wooden planks. They catch along the body by the door.

He hasn’t moved from where Sam dropped him. His head is turned away from Sam’s, all he can see is the bend of his neck beyond the hill of his torso and the weight of his shoulders. He can’t see much at all but some exhausted part of his brain seems to insist the rise and fall of the chest is more steady. It’s more comforting than it should be.

Sam's eyes are closed before he can stop them. He knows he should open them again. A weak voice in his head tries to convinced them to slip back awake, to get some idea of where he is, what he could do, why the hell this happened. But they won’t listen and eventually the voice falls silent.

\---

Sam wakes to a crash.

His eyes drag open to firelight on the wooden floor. For a minute a foggy memory of Bobby’s slinks through his exhaustion and then he tries to move. Tries.

"Ah—!” 

Pain snakes up over him with tight persistence, snapping all the memories right back into their wretched places.

He shuts his eyes tight against the sensation and tries to steady his breathing.

Another crash sounds and he remembers the first. 

This one sounds more like glass breaking, distant and clumsy.

Sam groans, grits his teeth, and with one last surge sits upright.

He can see more of the cabin now in the light from the wood-stove. The room really isn’t as small as he first thought. There’s a cot against one wall and a small kitchenette off to one side. There’s other things too, things he feels are going to end up being pretty important. Breathing steady and being capable of standing without getting dizzy win out against pretty much everything at the moment.

He knows what he needs to do next, but it still takes more than it should to turn and look towards the door. 

There’s nothing there. No one there. 

More glass falls off in the dark. 

Sam lets himself have one deep breath and then turns towards the sound, hand sliding around his waist towards Ruby’s knife as he stands on shaky legs. The knife seems stupid under his fingers, and he feels useless and clumsy, like a kid again holding dad’s weapons, still too weak to use them properly.

There’s a doorway, just one, off the main room, and a light coming from down in the dark of the hall it leads into. Sam walks towards it, fingers tightening and loosening thoughtlessly, heart hammering inside his chest with each staggered pace.

The light’s spilling out from a door that hangs just a few inches open, florescent and pale against the floor. 

Sam stands outside, listening as something moves beyond it, clumsily and sounding larger than it should. 

He swallows, and before he can realize just how much of an idiot he is or picture all the colorful, radiant styles of death and pain that might be awaiting, he shoves the door open, and—

_Bright—_

Nothing else, just bright - impossible, stupid radiance that could almost be in the shape of something approaching familiar--

But just as fast it’s gone with a shudder, leaving nothing but a simple bathroom and the staggered breathing of a blond man with knuckles clenched and white on the sink under him.

The mirror’s broken and there’s blood on one pale hand against the metal of the sink. Sam stares, suddenly unable to remember what the hell he had even expect to find in the first place and then eyes snap up through the broken mirror and meet his: blue and terrified and something else, something sharp and unfamiliar that Sam feels tighten in his chest.

"Sam-" 

His voice isn’t angry through his gritted teeth. Just… sad. So very sad. 

"Sam," He repeats like it’s something to hold onto in all the rest of it, and then something in the stare ignites and the look turns desperate, "What have you done?"

Lucifer turns to face him and suddenly his face contorts in pain and he cries out sharp and hard.

It happens again - just a flash, like something out of the corner of your eye that you try to forget a minute later, but it’s there, definitely there, and Sam recognizes the shape this time.

_Wings…_

But it’s only a flash and then they’re gone, leaving Lucifer in front of him, a cry ripping from between his teeth and then, all at once, the unconsciousness crashes back into him, eyes slipping shut as his whole body goes limp all at once.

"Hey--" Sam calls out instinctually as the body falls forward with all the weight of something dead to the world and the inevitable consequences of gravity.

Sam catches him without thinking. A reflex, that's all.

He’s heavy, but somehow not as heavy as he should be. Vaguely, through the total wreck this night has left of his brain, Sam remembers Cas being much heavier - which isn’t right at all because he wasn't as tall, or as large.

He’s warmer now too, warmer than he had been outside. But that only made sense didn’t it?

In any case he’s heavy. And unconscious. Again.

"Uh--" Sam tries, hands tightening and trying to get a better grip, at least enough to keep him from hitting the floor, "Hey?"

Nothing.

“Um, hello?”

No response. Shockingly enough.

“Fuck…” He mutters to himself because hey, at least he still has that. 

He looks back at the mirror. Still broken. 

He looks down at the man, angel, supreme dark lord, whatever. Still bloody.

And maybe he’s imagining things, because god knows he isn’t in his right mind right now, but the air in the bathroom feels strange, like it’s urging goosebumps up on his skin, and the air almost tastes funny… something like copper and sunlight. But that’s stupid, sunlight doesn’t even have a taste, does it?

Sam sighs. He could think about this - think about the fact that there’s a man collapsed in his arms who also goes by the more formal title of Price of Darkness, and also just happens to be an angel who’s bleeding when he really shouldn't be, unconscious when he really can’t be, in a bathroom that still smells like what Sam’s strongly starting to suspect is _wings_. But he's in a cabin, in the middle of the Canadian wilderness, and he can still feel the damp of snow in his hair and hear the wind howling outside, and for now, at least until he gets his brain back into functioning order, that’s that hand that’s winning. 

So, he doesn't think, he braces his knees despite the ache and drags the heavy-yet-too-light body back into the main room where the glow of the fire fills the space.

Sam drops him in front of the fire and takes a minute to look. 

Yup. Still him. Still definitely him.

"Shit." He says. Again.

Sam squints down and realizes for the first time that something isn’t quite right. Lucifer is wounded, but the strange burnt marks on his face, which he remembers from the last time they met, are gone. There's a good amount of blood on one side of his unconscious face, so Sam gingerly reaches down, slides a finger under the hair all brown and wetted with blood, and pushes it back to see the cut. It's stopped bleeding now, that much is clear. Head wound, messy, but nothing serious by Winchester standards.

He looks at his hand next - it's worse. There's a small bit of glass in the meaty part of his palm and that’s still bleeding. Sam studies it for a minute, and then reaches down curiously and pulls it out cleanly in one careful tug.

Lucifer doesn't move - doesn't even twitch. 

Sam thinks for a minute that shouldn't be something that makes him worried - hell, it should be something that makes him fucking ecstatic. But no - he already decided “not yet” to the whole thinking thing.

He puts a hand down on Lucifer’s shirt, testing - but it's not wet, hardly even damp. The outer shirt’s soaked through with melted snow, though, so Sam sighs and puts a few more logs into the stove before rolling him over to one side, and virtually kicking him out of it. Once he's got the thing free from heavy dead limbs he rips off a strip of fabric, and wraps it around the bleeding hand tight enough to stop the flow. 

Sam sits back and watches him for a minute. He looks useless there, so stupidly useless. And broken - like a toy someone threw aside when they were done with it.

Unbidden, he finds his fingers playing around the hilt of his knife and then, before the thought can complete itself, the thing is in his hand. It seems to move almost on it's own, lifting to finally rest point down directly above Lucifer's steadily rising and falling chest.

His brows tighten. He pushes, just enough for the tip to tear through the fabric of his shirt and hit skin. 

Sam grits his teeth, tightening his grip and watching as the tiny bloom of red spreads under the orange shine of metal in the firelight.

He looks back to his still face. He remembers the way he’d looked up, blue eyes bright in the florescent light and the broken bathroom mirror. Bright, and full of fear, and grief, and something else… something unfamiliar. 

Sam pulls the knife back to his side.

He’s lying down before he can think he shouldn’t be, and when he sleeps, he doesn’t dream.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"From the far star points of his pinned extremities_  
>  cold inches in - black ice and squid ink--  
> till the hung flesh was empty.  
> Lonely in that void even for pain  
> he missed his splintered feet,  
> the human stare buried in his face,  
> He aches for two hands made of meat  
> he could reach to the end of.  
> In the corpse's core, the stone fist  
> of his heart began to bang  
> on the stiff chest's door, and breath spilled  
> back into that battered shape. Now.
> 
> it's your limbs he comes to fill, as warm water  
> shatters at birth, rivering every way."
> 
> -Descending Theology: The Resurrection by Mary Karr

Sam wakes to grey light and the sound of ragged breathing.

There’s the feel the wood beneath his cheek, and an ache in his bones that suggests he's been unconscious on the floor for hours. The smell of lighter fluid and blood and smoke still lingers on his clothes. From where he’s situated he can just see through the small window beside the door. The sky is one pale mass, and though it's hard to tell, he’d be willing to bet that the blizzard has far from let up.

Perfect.

There’s a rasping noise behind him as the breathing he's been hearing behind him catches briefly, and, sighing, Sam forces himself to wake up enough to actively process the situation. Ruby’s knife is still resting beside him on the floorboards and the details of what’s climbing the charts as one of the worst nights ever are all snapping back into clear focus. 

With a groan, he sits up. His body’s echoing with hatred after what he’s put it through, but it’s more of a sinking soreness than the furious throbbing it was. Thankfully, the stove still feels warm against his shoulder even if he can’t see any flames still alive inside of it.

Squinting, he looks over towards the other body splayed out of the floor, and instantly he knows it’s all wrong.

Without thinking, Sam’s moving closer, unbidden concern filling up his chest as he tries to assess something he knows is beyond him. But Lucifer doesn’t seem quite as alien as he ought to, lying there. He seems broken, and broken’s all too familiar.

Lucifer’s shaking. He’s unconscious, but his eyelashes shiver as if his still-closed eyes are chasing shadows Sam can’t see around the ceiling. His lips are parted, muttering things too quiet and fragmented to understand, hardly words at all caught on frantic breathes. There’s a paleness to him and a clammy look to his skin that really shouldn’t make Sam’s stomach tense up in the nervous way it is. 

For a moment longer, Sam hesitates, finally reaching out and placing a tentative hand on his forehead. Instantly, he pulls back with a sharp intake of air. He’s burning, like there’s some blazing force raging against the confines of his body.

Sam rocks back onto his heels, staring down at the mess of twitching muscles and shallow breaths. He balances there for a moment, watching Lucifer’s lips ghost over lost words, hands tensing and releasing as if he’s still feeling the pain lace up and down his limbs.

He wonders for a moment if Lucifer’s feeling what he did the night before, that raw scrambling slicing all under the muscle and deep in the bone as if something terrified was trying to claw free from all of him at once.

With a sigh, Sam drags himself to his feet, staggering for a minute as the blood rushes back into his head and his legs remember how to work properly.

It only takes a moment longer of watching him there to make up his mind and a few minutes more to get Lucifer over to the cot against the far wall. 

Even if he’s not heavy any longer in a way that defies physiology, he’s still taller than Cas or Dean and it doesn't exactly make the process easy. Neither does the fact that his skin’s hot enough that it outright burns after holding on for more than a couple seconds, but he gets there eventually, rolling the dead weight of him up onto the cot.

Lucifer lands awkwardly, curling inward and shaking somehow harder than before.

Sam stays seated on the edge of the cot, watching him.

It’s wrong. All of it. It should feel great, fantastic, miraculous to see him like this: broken and helpless and stumbling over breathing as if he’s never done it before (and dammit he probably hasn’t). But it doesn’t feel great. Not even good. In fact he almost feels sick, watching the way Lucifer’s face shifts against what must be dreams in something all together too close to terror.

Sam’s stomach suddenly tightens hard and he realizes this situation is still miles from secure. There’s a fire, sure, and some wood, but who knows how long that will last? Let alone whether they’ll be able to find any food at all.

He has to do something to push back the anxiety gripping at his throat, and watching the crumpled mess of a being on the cot really isn’t helping. He has to look for supplies, evaluate their circumstances. Get organized. Yes, organized. Organized is good. He stands up.

Instantly a hand snaps out and catches him by the wrist, skin searing.

_“Mîkhā'ēl.”_

He’d heard it. He must have, even if it was hardly a whisper. 

Sam tries his best not to tug away from the hand holding him, looking down, following the grip on his wrist down to the body that owns it. Lucifer’s still seemingly dead to the world, lost between things Sam’s sure he can’t even start to imagine. But as he looks at him now the mutters almost seem to find their way into syllables.

_“Esh Okhalh—”_

The fingers tighten against his wrist just enough to notice.

_“Dai, bevakasha…”_

Carefully, Sam pulls the hand away with his free one and places it back down on the cot beside Lucifer’s body. The fingers twitch emptily against the blanket under them.

Sam feels his brow tighten 

He remember’s Dean’s voice breaking through the phone connection.

_“Two months, maybe three—“_

Sam crosses the room and picks up the knife. He finds a suitable place on the wall, leans over the smooth bit of wood and carefully etches one smooth line down it, marking this first day. He stares at it for a moment, testing the weight of the knife in his hand before sliding it back into his belt and turning back to the cabin with a sigh.

It takes him less than an hour to realize just how fucking lucky they’ve gotten.

There’s the main room that they’ve been in all this time, small enough to heat well but wide enough not to be claustrophobic. The small hall leads to the bathroom - the floor still covered with broken glass from last night, and to some backdoor to the outside that’s too snowed in to open, but through the glass he can see wood stacked all along the outside perimeter of the building.

The lights still turn on in the bathroom which means there must be electricity coming from somewhere, Sam guesses maybe a wind turbine he didn’t see in the snow or some solar panels on the roof. There’s no way they're on the grid so far out… 

The bare bones plumbing works, mostly, though the water’s freezing. Apparently just enough energy is expended to keep it from freezing solid in the pipes.

In the cabinets above the kitchen is the real find: beans, spam, tuna, rice, even some oatmeal and canned fruit. Whoever owns the place must have been some kind of survival nut because it’s probably the best case scenario they could have hoped for

Well, heat, food, plumbing, even some electricity all accounted for. What else? Well… everything. The main room is actually almost homey now that he looks at it, in a bizarro isolationist sort of way. There’s a desk with some papers strewn across it, maps at a guess, but he’s not going to tempt himself by looking at them just yet. There are a few bookcases against one of the walls and between them is actually one of those stupid novelty singing Bass things. Sam couldn’t help smiling, Dean’d laughed at that stupid commercial for weeks.

He walks over to it to get a better look and suddenly notices the books. There’s a familiarity to them, old and worn and… 

The realization spills over him in one cold jolt. It’s not an isolationist’s cabin. It’s something much closer to home.

There’s a chest next to the bookcase. Sam walks over, and kicks it open. The dark metal glints in the dusty shadows.

Guns. Lots and lots of guns, not to mention the knives, and the silver, and the rock salt.

“Jesus…” Sam mutters, and now as he looks around it all makes a bit more sense. 

Maybe it wasn’t just dumb luck that landed them here after all. Who else but a hunter would have a fully equipped safe house in the middle of nowhere? Whoever it was, Sam’s pretty sure he wasn’t getting out of this without owing them a beer. Or two. Or ten.

 

The rest of the day goes by faster than he’d thought it would.

He manages to get outside again, borrowing a jacket and some better boots he finds by the door. He was right. It is still snowing. 

There’s no wind turbine that he can see from here, but there are solar panels up on the roof, peeking out from under a good six inches of windblown snow which he manages to clean off without killing himself, by some miracle. There’s a ridge up behind the house that he should probably climb soon to get an idea of the terrain, but in the meantime there’s the lake, which is a good size, and he can see tracks amongst the tall stark pine trees, so hey, the small armory inside might get a shot at a more traditional sort of hunt.

By the time he’s fully taken in the place it’s getting dark again, which means he should probably get back inside. His headache has been building slowly since he started out, and for some reason the lingering threads of pain are more manageable in the vicinity of the cabin, so he shakes off the snow and heads back.

Not much has changed, and he realizes for the first time that maybe the reason he's been throwing himself into this whole wilderness survival deal is to avoid confronting the immediate problem. Lucifer is still lying in a pile on the cot, shaking and muttering and his condition is not showing any signs of changing and there’s nothing he can do about it. But what the hell is he supposed to do? 

He’s an angel for fuck's sake - and not just that, an archangel, arguably _the_ archangel, or at least in the top three of the batting order. He’s all the force of god and rebellion and fury condensed into one barely tangible form. But he hadn’t looked like that standing in that bathroom with grief in his eyes and his own blood on his hands. He didn’t look like that now, sweating and shaking and altogether too pale…

There’s always the possibility that he’s faking, waiting for Sam to drop his guard. But Sam’s isn’t so sure that a being which pretty much personifies pride and locked it down as the original sin would let themselves be seen like _this_ by anyone, let alone the one thing they’ve been trying to impress with a crystal cool demeanor for the past six months. 

But no, it doesn’t matter. The only thing that really matters is what he is, was, whatever, and what he wants. Destroy all humans, obliterate the infidels, spit in god’s face, whatever, and to do it all looking out of Sam’s eyes. Sam shouldn’t be feeling anything close to pity, shouldn’t even have brought him here in the first place. He knows that. And he wishes his brain would just get that already instead of insisting: _he’s broken and it’s your fault._

But he’s here alone. Really, truly, alone.

Except for him.

The rest of that first week doesn’t turn out much better and Lucifer’s lost through it all. 

He goes from a stony sleep, breaths so shallow Sam isn’t even sure they're present half the time, to tossing and turning frantically, calling out and sitting up in terror only to collapse again into a huddled shaking pile that curls in on itself, then lashes out at anything nearby, fighting with the blankets like they’re chains or worse.

Outside the sky doesn’t break - the grey constant and seemingly endless, drifting down snow more often than not. Sam knows he should go out, explore further, see more of whatever there might be to see, but he doesn’t. It’s the snow, definitely the snow, not some stupid worry that if he leaves when he comes back he might truly will be alone.

Lucifer’s fever holds steady, if that’s even the right word for the freakish heat that’s climbing all over him. Sam’s helps, or tries to, even if it's clumsy and pointless. But he’s trying, not that he knows why or how. He tries to feed him on the second day, an endeavor which concludes with more soup on the cot and Sam’s shirt than down Lucifer’s throat, forcing Sam into a necessary but freezing shower. He doesn’t try again.

The first few days after that are the worst, staring down, helpless, not knowing what he can do, if anything, not knowing what he should do, if anything. But it gets easier as the days pass by. Maybe he’s simply decided he wants to know for good if he's fucked or not. Or maybe, despite his best intentions, he’s not as good as he thought he was at leaning back and watching something helpless crumble to pieces. 

So, he tries to do something at least, insisting each time it’s because there’s absolutely nothing better do, and not because he cares or even comes close. It’s certainly not because there’s something simultaneously thrilling and sickening about seeing something powerful so unfathomably humbled...

He’d been worried about the heat at first and wondered if he should keep the fire down low but when he tried, Lucifer’d merely started shaking even harder. After that, Sam kept it where it was. Food hadn’t gone so well, but water seemed to be at least a bit more tolerable, so he gave him that when he seemed half way conscious, but even in those moments, he never seemed cognizant. His eyes would open, glassy and lost, staring around as though he saw nothing and everything all at once only to screw back shut desperately and seal the world away.

He seems to sleep quieter when Sam is closer for some reason, so on the third day Sam decides to simply not give a fuck and move the old ratty sleeping bag he’d found next to the cot, if only because the sound of him yelling out at nothing in the middle of the night was getting old fast.

Not that the new arrangement doesn’t have downsides. Sometimes Sam feels heat against him, seemingly from nowhere, and wakes with that smell of burnt light on the air in his nose and the taste of metal between his teeth, spots blotting against his eyes, as if he’s been staring at the sun. 

On the fifth night he’s woken by a hand grabbing his arm so hard he shouts in surprise.

Sam scrambles backwards, but he’s held tight, Lucifer’s fingernails digging sharp small half circles into the flesh of his arm. He tries to pry him off but it’s no use. The grip is impossible and scorching as it has been for days. Sam looks up at him frantically. 

_“Dumah-”_

Sam stops struggling, turning to look at him instantly. Lucifer is staring straight towards the ceiling with that glassy eyed, terrified expression, muscles immovable as though he is carved from granite, but for his mouth which falls open around hurried, gasped words.

 _“Dumah,”_ He mutters again, voice breaking, desperation seeping through the cracks, “ _Levad_ \- please, I—“

“Hey,” Sam breaks in, inching closer.

Lucifer’s head twitches towards him but doesn’t seem to see. His hand tightens again, enough for Sam to wince, feeling the ache against the bones of his arm now and knowing full well how colorful the bruises there will be soon enough.

“Hey!” He repeats louder.

He keeps breathing out gasps of lost ramblings, those low ancient words Sam’s been hearing for days. He doesn’t know he’s there.

Before he can think about it Sam reaches out and catches his face, turning it towards him, “Hey!”

The eyes focus, suddenly locking on his, terrified.

Sam stares, startled for a moment it’s actually worked. But the hand’s grip is still painful on his arm, Lucifer staring back at him, expression still lost and cornered.

“It’s alright.” The words find their own way out of his throat. “It’s me.”

The hand loosens, just enough to ease the pain.

“It’s alright,” he repeats. Lucifer’s eyes squint for a moment, as if trying to focus. Before they can, the weight of exhaustion seems to overwhelm them and they’re shut again as he rolls slightly, fingers still loosely wrapped around Sam’s wrist.

Sam sits where he’s left, staring at the now sleeping face as it seems to fall into something almost like peace.

He moves to pull his hand back and a small line of a frown appears between Lucifer’s eyebrows, so instead he leaves it where it is and settles back down himself.

The next day Lucifer sleeps straight through, no muttering, no flailing, hardly even moving, but breathing steadily at last. Sam tries to shake him awake around midday, but his skin is cool to the touch now and he won’t stir.

The day wears on with no change and by the time it gets dark Sam finds himself wondering if he should find some way to bind him at least. He’s better, seemingly, and if he wakes up for good… but that's just stupid. If he woke up himself rope would probably just be amusing, and if he wasn’t himself, well, that just didn’t seem right.

In the end Sam falls asleep a little further away from the cot than usual, trying to ignore the fact that even though he’s closer to the stove it still feels colder.

He dreams.

He dreams he’s falling so fast he’s breathless. The wind rips against his cheeks as hard as stone, body flailing dumbly against the weight of it, and he’s fighting, for something, he doesn’t know what, there’s nothing he can do to stop it, but he feels as if he should. His lips part as if to scream but there’s no sound, nothing but the fall, stealing even his voice from his ears with it’s speed. He opens his eyes against the wind but there’s nothing but black. The air he falls through is somehow colder than it was before, cold, and smelling of snow.

Sam wakes to a breeze against his cheek.

He shudders and sinks deeper into the musty smell of the sleeping bag, trying blindly to find sleep again. But the breeze doesn’t stop, just presses more insistent, chilled and firm down the back of his neck.

With a bleary groan, he opens his eyes

The door is open.

He sits up faster than he means to, looking around quickly. The cot’s empty, and that probably shouldn’t make his stomach drop in the way that it does.

Sam gets up quickly, searching the room for any indication that Lucifer has simply moved, but the open door can really only mean one thing so he hurries over to it and peers outside.

Instantly he has to squint against the bright white light bouncing off the snow despite the time of night. The sky’s cleared, for the first time since they found themselves here. The moon is huge. Even half full it’s still bright enough to cast firm dark shadows off of the trees and the mountains and turn the world into silver and blue and black.

Sam eases his eyes open again, peering through it. He sees him almost instantly and can’t help hating the relief that sinks into his chest. He’s standing just a few meters from the house. Just standing. Staring at the sky.

With a sigh, he turns back inside, quickly shrugging on a jacket, and tugging on boots before heading back to the door, and shutting it carefully behind him as he steps out.

It’s not quite as cold as it has been but his breathe still catches in the air. He knows his chest should be hammering, pulse racing, blood pounding as he approaches him and whatever he might be, but instead Sam finds himself stepping forward calmly, approaching one step at a time as if it’s the simplest thing in the world. 

As soon as he gets closer he notices Lucifer doesn’t have a jacket on and feels a slight surge of concern, but quiets it as he steps up beside him and looks over towards his face. 

Lucifer is looking up at the stars. 

His eyes are clear, bright and blue, free of the glassy fevered look they've taken on for days.

Sam doesn’t really know what to do. It should worry him. But it doesn’t. Maybe he’s still asleep. So he simply stands there, hands in the pockets of the jacket to guard against the cold, the slight breeze pushing his hair out of his face.

He follows Lucifer’s gaze up to the stars. They’re beautiful. Stunning, actually. It only makes sense, stars always look best in winter, and the cabin was far away from anything that might distract from their glory. Somewhere vague in the back of his mind he wonders if he’s ever come close to seeing them so clearly.

“Why?”

The voice is rough. Sam remembers it smooth and easy, honeyed milk, and summer air. It’s the same voice, just… it’s _real_ , now. Very real. In a way that slips through his ears and nothing else at all. 

Sam doesn’t look at him. “You know why.”

Lucifer lowers his head, away from the stars and towards the snow at their feet. Sam knows he should look over, look at him, but he can’t quite get there.

“It wasn’t going to be like that,” Lucifer says quietly. Sam thinks maybe his eyes are shut but he can’t tell, “It wasn’t supposed to be like this.”

“Yeah, well,” Sam says, turning his eyes away from the stars himself out towards the quiet span on the snow covered lake, “This is how it is.”

The breeze is too soft to make a sound. There’s no birds, no animals, nothing. Just the still, frozen silence, as if the world is stuck in time, white and lost and permanent.

“Why haven’t you killed me?”

Sam doesn’t move. He watches his breath catch against the vague outline of the mountains.

“I don’t know.” Sam sighs, finally, and looks down at the ground.

He notices Lucifer’s feet, naked toes curled against the ice.

“Where are your shoes?”

“I didn’t know I needed them.”

“What?” Sam says, looking at his face for the first time.

Lucifer stares down at his bare feet, smiling ruefully, “The snow. I didn’t realize it would be so cold.”

“It must hurt,” Sam says.

Lucifer raises his brows with curiosity as he studies them. “It does. Strange. It looks soft, doesn’t it?”

“Why’d you come outside?” Sam asks, voice softer than he’d meant it to be.

Lucifer looks up at him and that pale blue is somehow even brighter when it locks onto his eyes.

“I needed to see the stars… to know for certain.” 

Sam holds his gaze for a moment and then swallows. “Come back inside.”

Lucifer turns back to the sky and after a moment nods slowly.

Sam takes a few steps back a stops, making sure he’s behind him. Lucifer moves to pick up a foot and stumbles. Sam catches his arm without thinking and Lucifer grabs hold, tight. He’s not burning to the touch any longer, in fact Sam can hardly feel the warmth of him through his coat.

“Careful. Understand?” Sam insists as he rights himself.

Lucifer’s eyes shoot up to him sharply with a look almost close to anger but it quickly melts, eyebrows rising as if he’s confused. He drops his head again with a nod.

“Good,” Sam says.

He moves back towards the cabin, and Lucifer doesn’t let go so Sam doesn’t pull away. They make their way back through the snow, together casting one long shadow against the silver of the moonlight.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "I do not know what runs  
> through your  
> veins anymore,  
> whether it is toxins or  
> blood  
> I am not sure;  
> but I am positive  
> you aren't human  
> just a creature  
> developed from the  
> sadness that ate you  
> alive."
> 
> [-a.d.r.](http://rosemares.tumblr.com/)

Lucifer’s still asleep when Sam wakes up, rolled over to one side, facing away from him. His breathing is steady, the hill of his back stretching his t-shirt just a bit with each swell of his chest. He seems natural there, simple, like anyone else might curled up against the cold, blanket half tugged over them in sleep. It’s nothing like last night, standing out in the snow barefoot, staring at the stars like he’d never seen them before.

It’s stupid to worry about it. Pointless.

Sam needs a shower.

The water’s still freezing but it’s almost welcome. The past week’s been hazy, all fevered mutterings and a foggy sense of presence or purpose. The icy water shocks all that away. He likes the clarity. The past week doesn’t even have to exist. It can all float away down the small metal drain: the confusion, that strange sense of guilt and need, and worst of all that fear of loss which had no place being there.

Sam puts a hand against the wall and gasps against the cold, staying under the water as long as he can before his body starts to shake and he flicks the faucet off, stepping out again.

There’s only one towel he’s found in the place; it’s ratty and tired but a blessing despite all that. He wraps it around his waist and leans against the sink, looking up at his reflection.

It’s fractured.

The mirror’s still broken, though he cleaned up the pieces days ago. There’re no windows in the bathroom, just the dull green of the florescent light. Sam looks himself in the eyes as the sound of water dripping from his hair echoes against the sink.

He remembers how Lucifer looked, staring back at him from the broken mirror, the color of his eyes brilliant even in the shallow artificial light. Especially so, even.

He leans back, standing up properly with a sigh and running a hand over his face. He should shave. He found two razors stashed away in a small bag under the sink a few days ago but hasn’t quite managed to get there. There’s no shaving cream, not hot water, really it wasn’t worth it…

He dries off quickly and efficiently, pulling on the same old clothes (which he’s definitely going to have to find a way to wash soon) and shoves open the bathroom door, heading back towards the main room.

The cot’s empty.

Sam glances around the room quickly before walking towards the door. It’s shut, but out the window he can see Lucifer standing just a few feet from the house, inspecting their surroundings.

The sun is brilliant, sky as clear as it was the night before. The light shatters off the snow. The tall pines are weighed down with it, everything is, a flat white expanse stretching out until it hits the ridges where the rocks at the highest altitudes peak above the surface.

Sam lets himself watch for a moment and then sighs and moves for the door but stops himself and looks out again. Lucifer’s actually managed to put boots on this time, and the coat that Sam’s been wearing when he’s had to go outside. He has his hands deep in the pockets, as if he knows that’s where they should be.

Taking his hand away from the door, he turns back to the kitchen, filling a kettle with the snowmelt he brought in yesterday and putting it on top of the stove to boil as he sorts through the cabinets for two bowls and the dried oatmeal.

The door opens as the kettle starts to whistle.

Sam doesn’t look over, keeping his back turned and pouring the water over the oats as he hears boots kicked off and a coat hung where he must have found it.

“What are you doing?” the voice asks simply.

“Food,” Sam says.

There’s a grumble and the sound of a chair being moved around.

Sam turns with a bowl in each hand.

Lucifer glances up at him sharply from the chair.

Sam can’t help staring for a minute. It’s still strange, way too strange. His eyes are still blue, but in a way that fits within the natural spectrum. His demeanor still feels old and strong but it doesn’t have that knowing smile lingering in the edges any more.

“You look different.”

It takes Sam a minute to realize he’s not the one that said it.

“What?”

“With this,” Lucifer says, vaguely waving at his own body with an attitude of disgust, “You look different.”

“Yeah, well, so do you.” Sam concedes.

Lucifer snorts, as if Sam couldn’t possibly know how different he looks.

"Did I do that?" Lucifer asks.

Sam turns. Lucifer nods in the direction of his wrist. Sam follows his gaze. There are small purple bruises forming around where he'd grabbed hold of him.

"Yeah," Sam says, turning again, "You were dreaming. I think."

Lucifer's quiet for a moment as if he's considering that.

“If that’s for me, there is no need.” He says finally.

Sam glances down at the oatmeal in his hands. He’d almost forgotten it was there. He sets it down on the desk.

“You haven’t eaten anything for a week.”

“I haven’t eaten anything. Ever.”

Sam sighs and lets a grumble catch on the end, turning to face him and crossing his arms.

“How do you feel?” Sam asks.

Lucifer’s stare goes hard instantly, meeting Sam's eyes with something close to contained fury.

“Are you…?” Sam starts, hardly knowing why he’s even bothering.

“You should know full well what I am,” Lucifer says bitterly, “Or was this not your intention?”

“We didn’t exactly know what would happen.” Sam says truthfully.

“And are you happy with the results?”

“Depends,” Sam says, eyeing him a little more carefully. “I’m still not totally convinced you’re not lying.”

“I don’t lie, Sam, remember.”

Sam gives him a look.

“Alright,” Lucifer sighs in a bored way, leaning back in the chair, “If I was lying, why, if I was capable, would I chose to spend my time in such a humiliating and painful fashion? I assure you, if it was within my control, our time together would be considerably more enjoyable.”

“For who?” Sam shoots.

Lucifer furrows his brow with a small frown, “ I’ve never wanted to hurt you, Sam. You must know that.”

Sam shakes his head. “Yeah, sorry, still not really buying that.”

“There’s nothing to ‘buy’,” Lucifer insists, voice firm and quiet. “It’s simply the truth.”

“And this,” Sam says, gesturing at Lucifer's seated body, “This is the truth, too?”

Lucifer looks up at him. “The truth is that you’ve broken me.”

Sam can’t help the anger tightening his stomach. “You broke me first.”

Lucifer’s face twists as if he doesn’t understand and then he looks away, back down towards the floor.

“And what about your vessel?” Sam asks, almost shocked at himself as the words fall out. He’d almost forgotten he had a vessel, if he was totally honest.

“What about him?” Lucifer asks.

“Well, if you’re human.” Lucifer looks away sharply, as if the mention of it is painful. “Where is he? In there?”

Lucifer looks back at him. “He’s dead.”

“How?” Sam asks.

Lucifer’s stare doesn’t flinch. “Your brother shot him in the head.”

Sam stares, because, jesus, it’s maybe the first time he’s actually realized that…

“Right,” He manages. “So, it’s just… you?”

Lucifer’s shifts and for a moment Sam thinks he sees that same expression of grief in his face that he saw that first night against the broken mirror.

“Yes. It’s just me.”

Sam watches him for a moment and then shifts. “Can you prove you’re not lying? Prove that you’ve fallen?”

Lucifer’s shoulders harden against the chair, “I’m sorry that my display over what I assume has been days has not served as sufficient evidence for you.”

Sam snorts and turns towards to room, as if there’s something there that will give him a clue - which is just stupid, because of course there’s nothing, but then he stops.

There is a way.

The realization catches in his stomach, and his heart instantly starts to thud in his chest, but it’s real, it’s there, and it might be the only way to be certain...

He shouldn’t even be thinking it. If Dean were here, if he even knew he was thinking about it, he would shoot him before he got the chance… but it was a chance. And even thought he knew he should ignore it, push it way back in his mind and pretend he never even came close to considering the possibility, there’s a strange confidence stirring in his chest. Part of him knows already Lucifer isn’t lying, part of him has known since he first saw him collapsed in the snow. Why else would he have dragged him back, tried to help, do something, anything?

Sam swallows.

“Yes.”

Lucifer glances up at him with confusion scrawled into his eyes.

“…What did you say?”

Sam feels the confidence growing strong, pounding into his chest dangerously the way the demon blood used to.

“I said: yes.”

Lucifer’s face is blank for a moment, staring up at his, and then all at once it fills with so much fury that Sam feels himself taking a step back, but Lucifer only turns away, jaw tightening hard under his skin as his eyes shut.

“Did you not hear me?” The words fall out of Sam hard and cruel and sweeter than they should be.

“Stop it.” Lucifer bites. He’s still looking away from him, limbs tight around the chair he’s sitting in.

And Sam wants to stop, knows he should stop, knows it’s worked and he can be certain now, but god it feels so _good_. The freedom is pouring through him, the knowledge that he’s _safe_ , that they did it, they actually did it: it worked! No fire, no brimstone, no screaming valkyries or scorched lands or walking corpses or _anything_. Just the world. Simple, and stupid, and spectacular, and everything is going to be fine. It’s filling him right to the brim and he can’t help letting out a short laugh.

“You can’t do it,” Sam’s smiling and he can’t stop, “You actually can’t do it!”

“Don’t tell me what I can’t do,” Lucifer snaps, eyes flaring as he turns on him again, but the sheer power of this is thudding through Sam’s blood and he not only holds his ground but steps closer.

“But you can’t.” He says, leaning down, hating how good this feels and loving it all at one, “I’m here. The water’s fine. I know you want to. You just can’t. Can you?”

Lucifer’s intensity is rolling off in waves, “I said stop, Sam.”

“And you know why you can’t?” Sam presses, leaning even closer, “Because this is what you are now. Sad, and pathetic, and broken, and just like us.”

Lucifer’s jaw is still tight as a vice but Sam can hear his breathing picking up speed despite it, hot rushed puffs of pure anger.

“You’re human.” Sam whispers, “And you’re all alone.”

The fist shatters into his face before he has time to dodge it, or even know it’s coming.

Sam staggers back a few feet, reaching up towards his lip which is already swelling under the taste of blood between his teeth.

“Sam, I did’t—“ the voice is shocked and confused, but then it’s lost under Sam’s laughter.

And he’s laughing hard, harder than he’s laughed in a while because it’s nothing, it’s absolutely fucking nothing. It’s a split lip. The devil punched him in the face and all he has is a split lip and he’s had worse in bar fights most of his life and it’s so funny it aches in his stomach as he straightens up and shakes out his shoulders.

Lucifer is staring at his hand like he’s never seen it before, “You should have stopped when I told you to—“

Sam swings. And _god_ it feels good.

He follows through with his whole body, connecting with such force that Lucifer stumbles back, crashing against the desk and spilling the maps, the oatmeal, everything all over the wood of the floor.

And Sam’s still smiling but the laughter’s gone now, replaced with heated rush of air into his chest and he tries to breath it out because broken or not this is not a good idea and he knows that, but if that’s true then why does he feel like it’s the best idea he’s had in a long time.

Lucifer runs a hand under his nose, smearing a trail of red along his palm. He stares at like he’s never seen the color before and then his eyes turn to Sam and something in them goes dark.

He’s standing again faster than Sam expected but not so fast that he can’t catch his next blow off his elbow. Sam swings for his side and he doesn’t even try to dodge it, hardly making a sound as Sam lands the blow right under his ribs. Lucifer’s fist snaps back and catches Sam right in the jaw, and Sam’s still shocked at how fucking average it all is, and he swings hard with his left, catching him at an angle that makes him stumble - but it’s hardly a step back and he’s on him again, throwing his full weight against Sam and knocking him back onto the ground.

Sam scrambles for purchase, but Lucifer lands on top of him, swinging down again. Sam dodges and Lucifer’s fist hits the wooden floor with a vicious cracking sounds and Sam starts, looking up at him in shock but he hardly even seems to notice swinging down towards him again and catching him hard against the right side of his jaw.

Blinking hard, Sam sees him raise his fist again but a moment's sudden hesitation is all Sam needs. He grabs his shoulder and throws him to the side, smacking his back down onto the wooden floor hard enough to wind him and pinning him down before he can do anything else.

He tightens his fist and raises it to swing, but Lucifer doesn’t move. He doesn’t even flinch. He stares up at him, eyes dark and livid, but something else as well… something Sam remembers seeing before. He’s not moving. And Sam realizes he’s not even going to try to.

Slowly, his fingers uncurl without permission and he falls off of him to one side, breathing heavy in his chest.

When did he stop smiling? And when did the laughter turn to sickness in his stomach?

Lucifer doesn’t seem inclined to move from where he is and for some reason that’s making the rage in Sam’s chest light up in a whole new way and before he even knows what he’s doing he’s on his feet, grabbing the coat off the wall and shoving his way out the door.

The cold hits him hard and fresh and he sucks it in as well as he can through the anger tight and hot in his chest.

He doesn’t stop moving, walking hard and fast through the snow, further, anywhere, just away.

The snow’s deep and each step takes three times the effort it should, but it’s welcome. After thirty or forty the burning in his legs distracts enough from the dull thudding in his jaw and the sting in his lip that still has his mouth tasting like copper. And god he wishes that would stop because with that taste there all he can think of is the tangy feel of metal in the air of the bathroom, the broken florescent light and the echoing of brilliance against his eyes. It’s bright enough outside without that memory crowding up around him.

He tries to focus on that, on the snow and the light and the shape of the ridge forming up ahead of him, anything but the way he’d looked up at him lying there, unafraid and terrified at once, as if he was daring him to do something, anything. And that grief, that same grief that he’d had that night in the broken mirror. He had no right to look at him like that, and Sam had every right to wipe the expression off his face.

Why does he feel like he’s going to throw up and scream all at once?

He pushes it back, focusing on the burn in his legs as he takes one heavy step after another, and soon enough he realizes he’s heading up the ridge.

It’s just as it should be. He’s been meaning to get an idea of their surroundings since they found themselves here, it was just the snow that kept him in, that was all. Now it’s clear, brilliant. No better time.

He lets himself keep going, allows the exercise to burn in his chest until it squeezes out the rage to make room. He focuses on what’s in front of him, his footing on the rocky ground underneath, making sure that snow isn’t misleading his steps. It gets steeper soon enough, but he’s not so high there aren’t trees to support him, so he uses them, pulling himself up where it gets tricky and clambering even higher.

After what feels like almost an hour the trees start to thin around him and he shoves himself up the last couple meters to where the ground levels off again.

He stands, brushing his hair out of his face, chest heaving after the climb.

It’s a pretty solid view.

He sighs, trying to get his breathing back to normal, and takes it in.

The mountains somehow seem even larger up here. They spread out into the distance, vast and spanning, speckled with grey and yellow and white against the brilliance of the sunlight. He follows them down, closer. There’s ridges about the height of the one he’s on, and higher, falling off down into the valley that holds the lake. It’s bigger than Sam realized at first, he can see that now. It’s long and tapers back into the mountains, probably fed from the runoff in the spring.

He glances down. It’s easy enough to see the cabin. He realizes he’s not quite as high up as he thought at first. He can see all the details, even from here, the solar panels, the chimney, the windows glinting in the light.

He can see the footprints they’ve left. There’s two sets close together that make it about halfway to the lake and then circle back. There’s another left by one set of boots closer to the cabin than the other that Lucifer must have made that morning. He can see his own recent steps, leading heavily away and around the lake up and into the distance where he must have circled around to this point.

He looks for the tracks he must have left right after it happened, when it all went wrong and they found themselves here, but there’s nothing. And of course there wouldn’t be. It had only just now stopped snowing. He shouldn’t have expected a trace.

Sam breaths deeply and the air tastes like pine and cold. It’s nice. Refreshing. So he does it again.

There’s a small line of smoke twisting from the chimney. Sam gazes as it meanders up to the clouds and then watches them slip across the sky. They’re not many of them, but those that are there are solid and thick, like clouds from kid’s books and renaissance paintings.

He allows himself have once more sweeping glance and then turns and heads back the way he came.

The sun’s lower in the sky by the time he opens the door to the cabin. The light’s casting longer shadow’s over the floor, stark bright against the darkness.

There’s no one there.

Sam’s half tempted to call out but swallows it and steps inside, shrugging out of the coat and his boots to take a better look around.

He notices the desk first. It’s back where it was. The maps are pushed back onto the top and there’s no oatmeal on the floor. The two bowls are stacked neatly back on the counter in the small kitchen. Sam stares at them for a moment and then a sound turns his head towards the hallway.

It’s coming from the bathroom, like something slipping.

Quietly, he heads towards it, turning the corner to see Lucifer standing by the sink, examining his hard in the florescent light.

Sam can see his knuckles, broken and bloody from fighting. Lucifer doesn’t seem to notice him. He’s gingerly touching the broken skin as if he knows he should do something but doesn’t know what. He runs a finger down the back of one where the skin’s almost completely gone and hisses in air sharply.

“Hey—” the protest finds it’s way out of Sam on it’s own.

Lucifer turns to look at him. There’s still anger in his eyes, but it’s almost closer to shame, or maybe it’s just a trick of the light.

Sam sighs.

“Come here,”

Lucifer looks at him as if he doesn’t understand.

Sam nods at his hand, “You’re doing that wrong.”

“I’m more than capable—”

“You’re not.” Sam says simply, trying to keep his voice as kind as he can. “You’re just not.”

Lucifer’s eyes focus on his ruined hand and he frowns.

“Let me help,” Sam says.

It takes a moment, but finally he nods.

Back in the main room with proper light Sam makes him sit down on the cot and puts the kettle back on the stove to warm before pulling the chair over to take a better look.

It’s really a mess. The skin’s gone from the back of two knuckles and there’s bits of wood stuck here and there. One of Lucifer’s fingernails is red and angry and will probably go purple in a day or two and then fall off and leave raw skin behind.

Sam looks up at him, but Lucifer’s looking away toward’s the ground.

“You can’t fight like that, you know,” Sam says, looking back to his hand.

“Like what?” Lucifer asks.

“Like you don’t care if you break. Like you aren’t afraid.”

“I’m not.” Lucifer sniffs.

Sam frowns, “Aren’t you?”

Lucifer looks at him then. “I’m good at being broken, Sam. I’ve had millennia of practice.”

Sam swallows before answering, “Not like this.”

Holding his stare, Lucifer's shoulders relax almost imperceptibly. “No… I suppose not.”

Sam turns back to the raw flesh in front of him. Lucifer’s hand is shaking just slightly.

“I shouldn’t have…” Sam starts, squinting against the sight of the pink and red, “I should’t have done that.”

Lucifer makes a sound like he’s almost tempted to laugh, but it’s too bitter and short.

“I mean,” Sam corrects, brow furrowing because he doesn’t even know what he’s trying to do here, “I mean... I should have. I know that. I meant to. And it was right. And I’m not sorry, but…”

Lucifer’s hand twitches slightly where it’s rested.

“It was cruel.” Sam says finally. “And there wasn’t really any reason for it to be that…”

“It’s not your fault,” Lucifer says idly, “You’re accustomed to salting wounds.”

Sam sighs and leans back, watching as the shadows get just a bit longer across the floor.

“I don’t know why I hit you,” Lucifer says after a moment.

Sam glances over at him. He’s leant back against the wall, staring into space with a confused expression as if he’s trying to put together something invisible in front of him.

“I just did it.” Lucifer continues, “These bodies… I don’t know how you manage them and I don’t understand why you would want to. Anger and confusion and desperation all muddled together with chemistry and useless evolutionary pitfalls. It’s all quite clumsy.”

Behind them the kettle starts to whistle. It takes Sam a moment to hear it, but he does and turns. He pulls it off, pouring some in a bowl to soak some strips of cloth he made from an old sheet. He’s about to put it back and then thinks twice and opens the cabinet again.

After a few moments he crosses the room and pushes a bowl of soup towards Lucifer’s hands.

The cold blue eyes look at it for a moment and then up at him. Finally, slowly, the fingers reach out and close around it, pulling it close with his good hand.

Sam turns back and gets his own and the bandages and pulls the chair close again.

He turns towards the hand, tugging it over and resting it on his knee as he takes a warm cloth from the water and begins to wipe the drying blood away.

Lucifer flinches, then loosens again, apparently watching with mild curiosity. Sam pushes the loose skin aside to clean everything, stopping every now and again to remove a splinter or two.

“Eat your soup.” Sam says without looking up

Lucifer says nothing, but after a minute Sam hears him take a sip, and a moment later another, followed by a swallow.

“I’m _tired_ ,” Lucifer says, pushing the word out like it’s something alien and perverse.

“So sleep,” Sam answers simply, starting to wrap the dry bandages around the cleaned area.

Lucifer’s hand tightens just a bit.

“I don’t want to sleep.”

His voice is quiet enough that Sam looks up. Lucifer’s face is dark, hesitant and almost anxious.

“Dreams?” Sam asks.

“I never realized before,” Lucifer frowns, “How convincing you find them to be.”

“Yeah…” Sam answers. His throat is dry so he swallows.

He wraps the last of the bandage around, fastening it under the fold by his thumb, and drops his knee, letting the hand fall back to the cot. Lucifer glances over at it, as if he just remembered it existed.

Sam stands. “Finish your soup.”

Lucifer frowns at it, and winces as he swallows, but he finishes it all the same.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Our two souls therefore, which are one, Though I must go, endure not yet a breach, but an expansion, Like gold to airy thinness beat.
> 
> If they be two, they are two so as stiff twin compasses are two; Thy soul, the fixed foot, makes no show to move, but doth if th' other do.
> 
> And though it in the center sit, Yet when the other far doth roam, It leans and hearkens after it, And grows erect, as that comes home.
> 
> Suth wilt thou be to me, who must Like th' other foot, obliquely run; Thy firmness makes my circle just, And makes me end where I began.” 
> 
>  
> 
> ― John Donne

The water on the stove is already boiling by the time Lucifer stumbles into consciousness across the room. Sam glances over briefly as he sees him start to move. In the small space it's easy enough to hear the discontented noises he’s making as the world begins to push sleep away and he rolls his heavy shoulder over and tries to fall back into it. Sam almost smiles but pushes it away, trying to remind himself that he isn’t just some lazy idiot but the entity that has been solely responsible for systematically destroying his life. That being said, it’s a little bit hard to imagine the slightly disheveled thing sitting up on the cot and squinting at the world as though it was personally offensive being responsible for much of anything, let alone the apocalypse.

“Food again?” Lucifer asks, voice sleepily cracking and not at all hilarious.

“Again,” Sam confirms turning to take the kettle off the stove and throw another log in it, “And again, and again after that… pretty much the deal.”

“It’s a bad deal.” Lucifer insists, trying to sit up better and only half making it.

“Well, too bad, because it’s the one we’ve got.”

Lucifer’s eyes widen a bit out of bleary and Sam realizes that “you’ve got” might have been a better way to put that but oh well.

“You should take a shower,” he says, turning back to the oatmeal and a dusty can of hash he found in the back of the cabinet.

He can feel Lucifer watching the back of his head, “Why?”

Sam turns, “Because you haven’t had one since we got here and you’ve sweated through that shirt about eight times since then and frankly you’re starting to smell like a drowned raccoon.”

Lucifer’s lips pull a bit in the corner, “Are you familiar with that particular odor?”

“Just shower, alright?” Sam says, returning his attention to the food.

“How?” Lucifer asks after a beat.

Sam pauses for a moment and then smiles into the oatmeal.

“You go in there, strip, get into the shower and then just turn the handle.”

“That’s it.”

“You can figure the rest out yourself, I’m sure.”

He can almost feel Lucifer squinting at him, but after a moment he hears him get up and pad across the wooden floors towards the bathroom.

Sam stops stirring and waits.

There’s a handful of scrambling noises, a few disgusted sighs, then silence, silence, and finally the sounds of a metal handle being turned.

Lucifer screams. And it’s even more high pitched and frantic than Sam was hoping for.

He can’t remember the last time he actually laughed, but he’ll have to remember to do it more. It’s nicer than he remembered.

Lucifer emerges just as the hash is starting to brown up, glaring as Sam viciously. His wet hair and the way his clothes stick awkwardly to his frame, coupled with his perpetual attitude of arrogant distaste, give him the distinct appearance of a cat someone chucked in a river.

“I am _not_ doing that again.”

Sam can’t help still smiling, “Don’t be such a baby, it’s just a little cold.”

“It’s very cold.” Lucifer corrects sitting down in the chair by the stove and watching Sam continue to cook the hash in a pan on top. “You all can’t seriously put yourselves through such a ritual daily,” he adds, eyeing the food with a treacherous amount of interest.

“It’s not normally cold.” Sam explains, taking the hash off the stove and moving over towards the plates, “It’s supposed to be warm and nice, unless you're a psychopath I guess, so I’m not sure you actually deserve warm showers.”

“You’re friendly this morning,” Lucifer notes.

“Hey,” Sam insists, forking out the platefuls, “It’s not my fault you’re easier to get along with when you’re unconscious.”

Lucifer smiles slightly, “I’m not actually that used to company.”

Sam turns with the plates, “It shows.” He finds himself glancing at the bandages on his hand, "You should change those."

Lucifer glances down, "I don't-"

"I can show you how." Sam says, "How's it feel."

Lucifer tries to flex his fingers unsuccessfuly, "Uncomfortable."

Sam snorts and shoves a plate towards Lucifer who takes it with surprising enthusiasm while Sam pulls up the other chair and starts in on his.

He glances up just an inch to see Lucifer pop the first bite into his mouth. His eyes widen and he stares down at the plate before shoveling in another mouthful and another.

“Jesus, slow down,” Sam says.

Lucifer swallows and leans back.

“Why?” He asks, evaluating him quietly, “Concerned?”

Sam says nothing and turns back to his own food.

They sit in silence for several long moments.

“I’m going to go out today,” Sam says.

“Out where?” Lucifer asks, head shooting up a bit too quickly.

“There,” Sam says curtly with a glance towards the door.

“Why?”

“I wanted to try and shoot something.”

“Force of habit?”

“Force of hunger. I’m getting tired of cans, and we’re running low regardless. It makes sense to try and make the most of the environment.”

Lucifer nods quietly and forks up another bite.

Sam swallows and runs the words he wants to say over a few times, but they just seem to twist up wrong so he lets them fall out anyways.

“Will you be here when I get back?”

Lucifer lowers his plate, “What?”

“When I leave,” Sam says, staring into his oatmeal with particular care, “Will you run?”

“What would I ‘run’ from?” Lucifer snorts, “More importantly, where would I run to?”

“I don’t know. Away,” Sam says, meeting his eyes now, “Just… away.”

Lucifer holds his gaze, “No.”

Laughter catches sharply in Sam's throat. “Why?”

“Partly,” Lucifer says, “Because, strange as it may seem, I do not actually wish to be found in my current condition, and it would appear that this place is uniquely hard to find.”

At the explanation, Sam nods. Sensible enough. If Cas can’t find them, maybe Michael can’t either.

“But mostly,” Lucifer continues, “I won’t leave because this is where I have wanted to be for a long time. It seems rather foolish to run from what I've been seeking out.”

“This is where you’ve wanted to be?”

“It’s where I’ve known I would be.”

Sam laughs, “Really? Right there, in that chair, eating three year old canned hash?”

Lucifer frowns down at his plate and Sam sees that same expression in his eyes from that night in the mirror, a timeless sort of look that is somewhere beyond Sam's comprehension.

“I’ve been falling for sometime Sam, through darkness, and pain, and fire,” Lucifer says.

He looks up.

“And then I saw you, shining through the shadows, and I knew you would catch me one day.” Lucifer smiles weakly, “And I wanted that day Sam, sometimes I wonder if it’s all that kept me alive.”

Sam wants to look away because this isn’t right and he doesn’t want to hear it, he doesn’t care, but somehow he can’t manage it.

“But you didn’t catch me,” Lucifer says, “I fell right past you, further than I ever imagined I could, and now I wonder if I’ve finally hit the ground.”

“You never meant for me to catch you,” Sam says, “You meant for me to break your fall.”

Lucifer sighs, as if Sam still doesn’t understand. “Well, it seems this is as close as I will get.”

Sam gets the sense that he might be holding back a “for now” at the end of that sentence but he doesn’t press it.

Staring past his plate towards the flames in the wood stove, Lucifer seems prepared to divert the train of the conversation.

“I don’t understand Castiel.”

“What?” Sam asks, attention lifting up.

“I can’t understand how he would do this.”

“Do what?”

“Fall.” Lucifer says simply.

“Cas didn’t fall.”

“No… but he is, and that’s what makes it so strange.”

“Cas is falling?” Sam asks, trying to hide the slight edge of desperation in his tone.

“You hadn’t noticed?” Lucifer counters, looking right back at him.

He starts to say no, but he had, in hindsight. They’d been noticing things for months… little things, pieces of a puzzle they had yet to fit together, but it all made sense.

“I don’t understand.” Frowning back at the fire, Lucifer repeats himself with a degree of incredulity. “It must be horrible…”

“What do you mean?”

Lucifer gives Sam a look somewhere between pity and despair, “Can you even imagine what it must feel like to him?”

“Like what it was for you?”

Lucifer laughs bitterly, “No… that was more of a crash. He’s declining, slowly.”

As he explains, his face grows dark.

“You can’t understand…” he says, “It’s as if you were going lame, and blind, and deaf all at once and so much more, so much more. And all the while knowing you can stop it, but continuing on despite that, cutting yourself apart, piece by piece, each moment of each day.”

Lucifer holds his look to the fire for a moment longer and then with a small sigh turns back to his food shifting in his seat.

"I don’t think you truly appreciate how truly brave he must be to bear such a burden.”

Sam stares back, “No… I guess I don't.”

He tries to go on eating but the food doesn’t taste quite right now. He’s thinking of Cas closing his eyes for a second too long in the back of the car, stealing a single fry off of Sam’s plate, smiling when Dean smiles… He wonders if Dean knows, if he’s told him, if he even comes close to suspecting. He must - but why would he? Sam didn’t.

“Can I come?” Lucifer asks.

Sam shakes himself out of his thoughts, “What?”

“With you? Shooting things.” The look on his face is stupidly childlike for a being older than sin.

“Uh, no,” Sam says, shaking his head, “I don’t think that would be a great idea.”

“Why not?” Lucifer asks, making no effort to hide his disappointment.

“Hunting isn’t really a group activity.”

“You seem to treat it as one,” Lucifer argues.

“That’s different, that’s not—“ He’s going say “real hunting”, but that’s not right, “It’s just different, alright? When you’re going after… normal, things, you tend to do it on your own. I mean, you can go as a group, but you always end up heading off sort of on your own so the animals don’t get startled.”

“Then can I help?”

“Can you even shoot?” Sam asks.

Furrowing his brow like he has never considered it, Lucifer shrugs. “I don’t know.”

“So yeah, not so much then.”

Lucifer sighs loudly and collapses further into the chair, “What should I do, then?”

Sam laughs, “I don’t know,”

“It’s dull.” Lucifer spits, like he hates the taste of the word, “I need some sort of occupation.”

“What, since destroying humanity is out?”

Lucifer gives him a hard look that’s weirdly close to the face Dean makes when Sam asks him if he wants to 'talk about it’.

“I guess you could bring in some wood,” Sam gives in, “And there’s some books, you could check those out. Learn how things work - don’t break anything. And don’t play with the guns.”

Lucifer rolls his eyes, “Thrilling.”

Sam stands up and stretches as he does, arching his back and trying to twist a kink out of it. With a sigh he falls back into a normal posture and reaches down for Lucifer’s plate but Lucifer doesn’t readily notice, seemingly staring at Sam’s waist.

“What?” Sam asks.

His voice seems to break Lucifer out of something and he looks up at Sam’s face quickly, “Oh, no, nothing.”

Sam shakes his head, “Whatever,” he sighs, reaching over to grab the plate.

He shows Lucifer where the the wood pile is and some other stuff for sorting out the kitchen in case he gets freakishly hungry again, then bundles himself up, snatching one of the .308 calibers from the chest and heading out the door.

It's cloudy but, thankfully, not snowing. Unfavorable weather would have made the whole thing harder, not that’s it’s going to be close to easy. He can’t remember the last time he went hunting in any sort of classic sense, he thinks it might have been when he was ten and he and Dean had a week or two at Bobby’s.

He’d taken them out, told them John made him promise he wouldn’t let them get rusty but they were going to make themselves useful while doing it. He showed them how to look for the right signs and how to stay still, which Dean had been shit at but Sam had found surprisingly easy and relaxing in a way that was unfamiliar to him.

There was something impossibly peaceful about slowing down like that. He’d laid on his stomach and tried his best to breathe without making a sound, to not shift his body an inch. He’d felt each part of himself, known what each movement would do. Dean said he was bored afterwards but Sam hadn’t been. There had been so much to see, tiny little worlds to watch and take a quiet, simple pleasure in. Ants had moved over the leaves, birds had perched and watched him, preening and bobbing, and all the while he seen, looked through the vast intricacies of the wood to catch sight of his objective.

Of course, this is different. That had been the woods, in fall, and this is deep snow and a dramatically different landscape, but the basics are hopefully the same: silence, patience, care.

He walks a ways and scans the area for a promising spot. There’s a tighter group of pine trees along the shore line of the lake and he’s close enough that through the scope he can just make out the hints of criss crossing tracks diving in and out of it, so he heads in that direction.

It’s colder today than it has been. He dips his chin down into the high collar of the coat and breaths warmth down to his neck, shifting the weight of the gun on his shoulder while he walks and tries to keep quiet while his ill-suitedly large feet make their way through at least two feet of powder.

Eventually he reaches the tree line, easing in between the branches and looking for a place with relatively decent cover. There’s a small group of pines that seem a bit younger than the rest, branches low enough to create a small tent where the snow weighs them down to merge with the ground. Sam climbs under as gracefully as possible, wedging in out of sight and lying down on this stomach, sinking into the snow just a bit. From there he evaluates the visibility, adjusting a bit until he can see well out of the branches on either side and has a decent shot into what looks like passageway for animals moving through the wood. There are obvious tracks littering the snow so he hopes this won’t all be a waste.

He waits, quietly gaining familiarly with the sounds and the movements of this new place. Accumulated snow falls from branches every once in a while, landing with a dull thump. Occasionally he’ll see a squirrel shoot up a trunk but he’s not quite that desperate yet, so he ignores them.

As he sinks deeper into the snow and the sounds of the wood, thoughts slink up on him in the total quiet of it.

His thoughts end up where they usually do in stillness and silence. But he still can’t seem to make them fall into any reasonable place.

It’s strange. There's not a perfect slot for Lucifer to fit into his way of processing the tangle in his head. There’s the gaping black hole where he knows he should fit, right next to Sam’s own mess of loss and grief and the fury that he feels might burn him up from the inside some nights. He knows that’s the place for the enemy, Lucifer, the devil, but the thing sitting back at the cabin just won’t seem to match the shadow he knows he should be casting.

The idea of “Lucifer” is _massive_ and distant, inestimable and indistinct, like a concept he can't grasp with a name he doesn't know, some synonym for all Sam knows it should mean: evil, destruction, loss, pain, wrath. It doesn’t feel like the distinctly nonthreatening face that tilts up to him from a plate full of oatmeal and screams when it accidentally gets in a cold shower. It certainly didn’t feel like a whimpering crumpled mess of fever and nightmares and pathetic vulnerability. That had felt like something broken and defenseless, and the messy haired blond thing loading wood in a vague attempt to be helpful and punching him like a bar drunk seemed like something else all together, something familiar in a way that should have been uncomfortable but somehow was even weirder because it wasn’t.

But there was no denying the existence of an undercurrent that surfaced sometimes in his eyes, something that seemed so old and so furious and so sad that there was no pretending it was simple. It was familiar, too, in a way Sam didn’t quite understand, and not nearly as terrifying as it should have been.

_“Why didn’t you kill me?”_

The question echoes in his head often enough, but he still doesn’t know the answer. He thinks maybe sometimes he’s a bit too curious for his own good. Maybe he’s just too used to helping things that need help.

But there’s a darker part, a shadowy whisper he always tries to swallow back that remembers the feeling of blood on his lips, that loved the way it felt to tug to life out of something and watch as a shock unlike anything else flooded their eyes. That part thinks it’s not about helping something helpless, it’s about watching something powerful crumble and the feeling of strength that comes from that.

Sam shakes that thought away, it doesn’t have to be a part of him if he doesn’t let it. In the end, maybe he just wants to understand.

A tiny bird lands on a branch close enough to see it little toes curl around the branch He doesn’t recognize the species. It’s plain, brown, black in a few places, white underneath. It sees him, twisting it’s head a little curiously and hopping back and forth.

Sam thinks of Cas.

_“I don’t think you truly appreciate how truly brave he must be…”_

He was right.

They know he’s strong and he’s unique and he’s given up a lot… but they never really think about it, do they? There hasn’t been the time to.

Cas is the one good card they have, and that’s all that’s really mattered. Of course they care, of course he matters, but it was hard to see something like him and assume it to be broken. They’ve treated him like a tool, which maybe was easier because of his manner, but it really shouldn’t have been…

Looking at the bird he remembers a story that he heard once, maybe during some class those few years at school, or maybe from one of Bobby’s old books when he was little.

It was about an ancient Indian king, a good king. He went into the woods for a walk on summer day and found an injured bird. He stooped to help it, but then a hawk appeared and told the king he was interfering and the hawk needed to kill the bird. The king refused to allow it, and the hawk told the king how it had children of it’s own that would starve unless the king gave up the injured creature. The king did not know what to do, so he told the hawk that he would give some of himself, the same weight of the bird, to feed the hawk’s children.

There were scales - Sam forgets how they got scales in the woods, jungle, whatever, but it doesn’t matter. The king put the injured bird on one side and took his knife from his belt and cut a chunk of flesh from the meaty part of his thigh and laid it on the other side. But the scale wouldn’t move. He did it again, and again, but still the bird weighed impossibly more, until finally the king put the knife aside. The hawk asked if it could take the bird after all, but the king refused and placed himself on the scale, and only then did the weight level. The king told the hawk to take him in the bird’s place. And when this was done the bird transformed into something magical (faery, genie, something) and blessed the king’s land with wealth and happiness, or something along those lines…

Sam’s not sure why he remembers it suddenly. It’s a bit of a silly story really. A little broken bird realistically isn’t worth anything to someone who controls an entire kingdom, who the world depends on, whose span and breadth doesn’t even come close to the little thing’s comprehension. But it’s he remembers it strongly all the same.

He had always wondered what kind of person could cut themselves apart like that for something seemingly so worthless and already broken. He thinks he might know the answer now.

Something skitters off to one side. The bird flies and Sam’s vision shifts.

It’s a rabbit, slowing enough to glance around with glassy, anxious eyes. It’s white, barely noticeable in the snow except for the way it’s ears twitch silently back and forth. It hops twice and then stops again. Sam focuses through the sight, finger drifting over the trigger.

The rabbit lowers it’s head to sniff at something on the ground. Sam closes one eye.

Something snaps off in the wood. It’s head turns up, for a moment seeming to look directly at him, and Sam shoots.

—

It’s dark by the time he gets back. The snow’s turned all blue and indigo and the windows of the cabin shine golden and bright against the gathering dark.

He adjusts the gun over his shoulder and the carcasses in his hand and shoulders his way inside.

The heat is a welcome wash over his face and he closes his eyes for a moment with a small smile as it eases up over him. He steps in, kicking his boots off on the side before shutting the door and turning around—

“Holy shit.”

The entire floor is covered with probably every book in the place, laid out open in a circular pattern spreading out with small channels between them and Lucifer sitting in the middle looking up at him with a hand on the pages in front of him, marking his place. And that would be weird, that would be interesting, but then the array of books ends the guns start. It must be every gun from the chest, or close to. He’s taken them apart, piece by piece and laid them out in neat organized spreads that pick up where the books stop.

“What the fuck?” Sam starts.

“It was dull.” Lucifer says, eyeing the rabbits Sam has slung over his shoulder.

“This looks like a serial killer den.”

“Maybe it is,” Lucifer notes.

“I told you not to touch the guns!” Sam yells.

“You told me not to ‘play’ with the guns, and I was not playing with them. I was understanding them.”

“Jesus christ-”

“I was intrigued by the mechanism and wanted to explore it further. It’s really almost clever, really, in a redundant, barbaric sort of way…”

“You took them all apart?” Sam asks, staring down at the ordered chaos around his feet.

“Yes,” Lucifer says furrowing his brow, “And then I became distracted by the books again and now they seem to remain disassembled.”

Sam sighs and runs a hand through his hair brusquely, “Did you even read the books?”

“I looked at them,” Lucifer insists, “It seems I can’t read quite as quickly as I used to…”

“Alright,” Sam says finally, “I’m going to make dinner and you are going to clean up.”

Lucifer frowns down at his array as if he doesn’t wish to part with it, “I might need some help with the guns…”

In the end he doesn’t need much help at all and remembers surprisingly well how most of them go back together. As he works, Sam skins the rabbits over the sink and hangs two up outside, cutting the third into chunks for stew.

With quiet but half-divided fascination, Lucifer watches him, silently returning everything to it’s proper place.

Sam’s spooning out the steaming stew that smells like gamey heaven when the voice starts up again behind him.

“I found this,” Lucifer says.

He’s holding a fairly nondescript bottle two thirds full of amber liquid, gesturing with it when Sam turns to face him.

“And several others of a similar nature.” Lucifer tilts the bottle to one side, watching the liquid move inside, “Is it dangerous?”

Sam eyes it for a moment and then turns back before thinking about all the ways this might be a bad idea.

He grabs two glasses. “Definitely.”

The second drink tastes better than the first, which probably has nothing to do with the actual quality and a lot more to do with the potency but Sam doesn’t mind. He’d forgotten how awesome booze could be. After a day in the snow with an actual fresh warm meal settling into his stomach, the smoky hard taste of what he thinks is whiskey on the back of his throat feels more than good. Great.

Lucifer seems to find the experience very interesting. He’s leaned back in the chair by the stove. The room’s gone dark by now, just the light of the fire all around them, catching on the glass he rolls in his hand, staring down at the liquid as if he’s trying to see the molecular structures that are producing these fascinating effects on him.

He doesn’t seem drunk, just sort of… collapsable. His eyelids hang a little more lazy, mouth doesn’t seem quite as eager to shut completely, lips remaining parted slightly, limbs sagging comfortably against the frame of the chair.

“I want to ask you something.”

Sam only realizes he actually said it when Lucifer’s eyes slide up to his with interest.

“Well,” Sam corrects, getting a little annoyed at his tongue for being that much heavier than usual under the influence of alcohol, “I don’t want to ask you something… I want to ask you lots of things.”

Lucifer’s eyes dance in the firelight, “What kind of things?”

“Why did you kill Jess?” Sam says it faster than he meant, words hanging sharp and hard in the air. He swallows before continuing, “Why did you kill our mother?”

Lucifer’s quiet for a long moment and Sam can hear the question echoing back and forth in his own brain clumsily.

“Does it help to think of me as responsible?” Lucifer says finally.

“Are you?” Sam asks.

Lucifer sighs and turns back towards the fire, “Demons are messy and cruel. I gave them an end and they produced their own means. They can be surprisingly inventive.”

“You never told them to kill her?”

“I told them I needed you. That’s all.”

Sam swallows, “But you made them. Demons.”

At this, Lucifer’s face grows shadowed despite the light of the fire, “I was angry.”

Sam can taste the heat of liquor tight on his tongue, “Is that your excuse?”

Lucifer looks over at him, eyes bright and blue against the fire, “Have you ever done something stupid when you were angry, Sam? Something you always hoped you might be able to take back?”

Sam doesn’t answer him, he takes another swig instead, emptying half of the glass.

Lucifer apparently doesn’t mind not getting an answer because he turns back to his own whiskey as well, having a small elegant sip and wrinkling his nose, “Is the taste supposed to be pleasant?”

Sam shrugs, “Eventually, maybe.”

“Then what’s the point temporarily?”

“Side effects, mostly.”

“Mmm,” Lucifer acknowledges.

The fire cracks sharply in the stove, sending a quick flare of sparks against the glass. Sam leans back, adjusting himself on the floor boards more comfortably. They creak against him and it doesn’t really work so he gives up and leans back on his elbows stretching his feet closer to the fire.

“I want to ask something too,” Lucifer says suddenly. Sam glances up at him. He’s still looking at the fire but a lazy smile pulls over his face, “Well, lots of things.”

Sam shrugs like he really doesn’t care either way.

Lucifer quiets for a moment and then furrows his brow, “You said I ‘broke you’ first.”

With careful nonchalance, Sam drains the rest of his glass and tries not to feel the way Lucifer’s watching him.

“Did you mean that? Do you truly think you’re broken, Sam?”

Sam’s starting to regret starting this conversation, but the booze is clouding up in his head and making the words flow too easily.

“Yeah,” He says with a shrug, “Of course.”

Lucifer’s staring at him, he can feel it, and he shouldn’t look back at him but he does anyways and then he can’t look away. Lucifer’s staring at him like he’s something unfathomable, impossible.

“You aren’t broken Sam.” Lucifer says, stare burning, “You’re the very opposite of that.”

Sam feels his chest squeeze but he tries to swallow it down, wrenching his stare away with a forced laugh that comes out a bit too clumsy to be believable.

He focuses on his glass until he feels the heavy sensation pass.

“You said something too,” Sam says eventually.

Lucifer glances towards him.

“You said you fought like that because you weren’t afraid of being broken,” Sam looks to him, “Did you mean that?”

Lucifer considers for a moment, “Yes.”

“But,” Sam tries, “You’re afraid of something?”

Lucifer squints against the flames, “I’m afraid of death.”

Sam adjusts on the floor, “Yeah, well, who isn’t?”

“No,” Lucifer interrupts, “You don’t understand… I’m—”

He wrinkles his forehead like he doesn’t quite know know to put it. Sam says nothing, simply watches him, and waits.

“I’m afraid I won’t know how to die.” Lucifer sits perfectly sit, the light of the fire catching hard on the angles of his face, “I’m afraid there will be no place for me, no heaven, no hell… just a fall through the dark that never ends.”

Sam can’t seem to find anything to say to that. So instead he reaches behind him and pulls the bottle to the front, filling up his own glass. He glances up at Lucifer raising the bottle slightly in question. Lucifer pushes his glass closer so Sam fills it up again.

This time when he leans back Sam notices he takes a significantly larger sip.

“Your turn,” Sam says.

Lucifer turns with a questioning look.

“For a question.” Sam clarifies.

Lucifer’s quiet for a moment, “Where did guns come from?”

Sam laughs, and tells him. He tells him until his words blur, and his body slumps and his eyes are too heavy to keep open any longer.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> DRUNK SONNET 8  
>     
> "WANT TO LOVE BUT PLEASE LET ME KNOW  
>  HOW IS THAT I CAN YOU CAN EVEN EXIST NOW  
>  I JUST FELT THE ALCOHOL IN MY FEET   
> MY HEART HAS A LOT INSIDE IT I THINK, EVEN STILL
> 
> IF EVERYONE IS OK THEN WHY I AM I NOT   
> IT’S OK TO CRY A LITTLE, I THINK, JUST CRY   
> I THINK I WANT TO EAT YOUR SMILE TONIGHT   
> I THINK THERE’S SOMETHING IN IT TO KEEP ME ALIVE
> 
> I’M LOOKING AT THIS SLEEPING CAT RIGHT NOW   
> AND HE JUST SHIFTED A LITTLE AND IT WAS NICE   
> AND THE OCEAN’S FLOOR IS SO FAR AWAY
> 
> SINKING TOGETHER WOULD BE A COMMITMENT   
> AND RISING TOGETHER AN EVEN BIGGER ONE   
> BUT I THINK THAT ALL THAT WATER IS TOO MUCH"
> 
> -Daniel Bailey  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's going to get obvious fast I'm a Paradise Lost nerd... but if you want more details about some of the theology in this chapter see the end of chapter notes.

Routine’s important, he remembers reading that somewhere.

It’s what they said, wasn’t it? Get a routine, stick to it, and that’s what stops you from going nuts in the most extreme of situations. Maybe it was true after all, because somewhere along the line this had all become weirdly normal.

Breakfast, chores sometimes, hunting mostly, dinner, booze, questions.

He never quite manages to start asking before he’s two down, but Lucifer always waits, patient and contented as if he knows Sam will always start.

“Do angels have sex?”

“That’s forward,” Lucifer laughs.

“Just curious.” Sam shrugs, “Some of you seem… I don’t know. Anna slept with Dean.”

“Did she really?” Lucifer smiles, leaning back for a sip, “Good for her.”

“But she was fallen… so maybe that doesn’t count.”

“We do. ‘Have sex’ that is.” Lucifer says, “In a way.”

Sam raises his eyebrows, “Really?”

“Adam asked the same question, you know. Raphael had to explain it to him.”

“Adam? As in _the_ Adam? And... _Raphael_?”

Lucifer nods.

Sam laughs, “That is a conversation I would have liked to hear.”

“Tell me about it,” Lucifer smiles.

“But,” Sam continues, “It’s … different? Sex?”

“It’s more a connection of soul than body, like a merging. But the results are… more intense.”

“Intense as in…”

“As in you can’t possibly imagine.” Lucifer grins darkly.

Sam rolls his eyes and Lucifer shrugs as if he can’t help the truth.

The fire cracks a few times and then Lucifer seems to think or something, leaning forward to rest his forearms on his knees.

“What’s ‘pornography’?”

Sam chokes on his drink.

Lucifer eyes him with concern, “Problem?”

“Uh no,” Sam says wiping his mouth and trying to recover, “I just never thought I’d have to explain porn to, you know, _the devil_.”

Lucifer looks at him expectably.

Sam laughs and shakes his head, “It’s, ummm…” He squeezes the bridge of his nose, “It’s a way for people to get sexual gratification without actually having sex. It’s mostly visual.”

“Observing sexual acts?”

“Yeah, pretty much.”

Lucifer considers, “…Doesn’t that rather defeat the purpose?”

Sam looks up “What do you mean?”

“The point is procreation, isn’t it? If its a simulation, isn’t it a means with no end?”

Sam sweeps a hand through his hair, “I guess you could say that, but people are built… we're made to _want_ a lot, and sometimes I guess making the effort is just too time consuming.”

“So, it’s mainly masterbatory,”

Sam’s laughing again, “How do you know ‘masterbatory’ but not ‘porn’?”

Lucifer shrugs.

Sam squints, “…You knew what porn was already, didn’t you.”

Lucifer smiles into his glass, “Maybe, but it was a lovely explanation all the same.”

Sam’s tempted to throw something at him but he resists and pushes closer to the heat of the fire instead.

He knows it’s his turn, but he finds himself thinking longer than usual before he finds a question.

“Did you always hate us so much?” Sam asks finally.

Lucifer takes a long moment and then shakes his head, “No.”

He takes a deep swig. Sam gets a kick out of the little things he gets better at everyday: making sure the fire keeps going, washing his clothes when Sam’s out, drinking like any other hunter who might have lived in this place.

“I didn’t hate you at all in fact,” Lucifer says, face opening slightly as if he hasn’t thought about it in a long time, “I was curious and I wanted them to understand me.”

“Who?” Sam laughs.

“Them,” Lucifer waves vaguely, and Sam smiles at the noticeable drag to his motions that he’s learned mean he’s starting to feel the booze, “You know,”

“Adam and Eve?” Sam guesses with a grin.

“Yes, them.”

Sam laughs and shakes his head.

“I liked them. Her especially. She was brave and asked questions when she wasn’t supposed to… I can relate to that, you know.”

Sam leans forward in his chair, “Was she hot?”

Lucifer rolls his eyes like Sam is being especially childish, “She was glorious. Pure creation.”

“So, what happened?”

“I tried to tell them, I tried to explain what they deserved, the freedom they could have. They wanted but they didn’t _understand_.” Lucifer sighs, “I don’t think they were designed for that…”

Sam feels himself wondering how much people have changed since then. He wonders if it had been him if he would have understood. Divine right had sort of gone out of fashion a while ago...

He wonders if Lucifer meant to say “them” instead of “you”.

“And then, once I had given them everything, they shunned me, they hated me. They didn’t understand what a gift true freedom was.” Lucifer says, eyes darkening as that look of ancient anger spills into them, “They cried and wailed and _repented_.They forgot me, called me monster, like they all did. And I hated them for that.”

Sam watches as his fingers tighten against the warmth of the glass in his hand.

“And then I was back in the pit, more alone than ever.”

Sam can see the fire lighting up the blue of his eyes.

“I didn’t hate you always,” Lucifer says, “But you didn’t understand, you were so weak, and that soured within me and turned into anger and then to fury and then to hatred.”

Lucifer looks over at Sam, his voice is still strangely casual, “Hate lasts in hell. It’s the only thing that holds you together in the end. How do you think Dean lasted so long? How do you think he still has a soul that hasn’t collapsed into rotting mush? It’s that hatred, holding him together.”

“No,” Sam says suddenly, “You might think that, he might even think that, but it’s not true.”

“What is it then?” Lucifer asks, and Sam thinks he sees something in his eyes that might be desperate for an answer.

“Hope.” Sam says.

Lucifer stares at him for a long moment and then leans back with a small smile.

 

Sam shoves his way into the cabin, knocking the snow off his hair as he does.

Lucifer’s adjusting the fire just like Sam knew he would be. It should probably worry him how familiar that’s become. Him there, waiting.

“There’s at least six more inches,” Sam says, toeing out of the boots and shoving them close to the wall where they won’t melt on too much, “It must have been snowing into the morning.”

When he turns Lucifer’s smiling at him a bit too wide.

“What’s wrong with you?” Sam asks shortly.

“I got you a present.” Lucifer says.

Sam laughs, “What? A pinecone?”

“Much better.”

Sam narrows his eyes, “Alright, stop smiling like that it’s creeping me out. Just tell me what it is, and if it’s some sort of freaky ritual or blood sacrifice I swear to god—“

“I fixed the water.”

Sam stops, “What?”

Lucifer shrugs like it’s not a big deal, which would be convincing if the self contented air wasn’t flowing off of him in waves.

Sam hurries over to the sink and flips it on, shoving the handle in the direction that’s always just been more cold.

He waits a minute, then another, and finally the water goes warm and soft over his skin.

Sam turns to him in shock, “How…?”

“There’s a book on the solar paneling system,” Lucifer says, gesturing to the pile of things he’s been amusing himself with, “I’ve been taking some time to learn it and discovered the mechanism for the water heating.”

Sam lets out a short laugh while his head fills up with images of Lucifer plodding through a book on solar panels and actually managing to understand it enough to presumably climb up onto the roof somehow and fix the water.

“The shower?” Sam asks, still stunned, “The shower _works_?”

Lucifer grins, “Absolutely.”

Sam’s half way across the floor before he even realizes it and then makes him self stop and turn back, “You fixed it, you should, I mean, are you sure you don’t want to—”

“I already had one, thank you,” Lucifer says, “You were right, _significantly_ more enjoyable.”

Sam hardly takes a minute to grin before he’s in the bathroom, slamming the door and shedding clothes as he turns the faucet on. The steam starts to fog up the mirror and he’s smiling so wide he thinks he might break his face, but that’s not stopping him.

All at once, he's under the water and doesn’t even try to stifle the long groan that drags out of him. It’s perfect. It’s beyond perfect. It’s fucking heaven.

He turns his face up into it, or attempts to. He has to tilt his face sideways, as the fact that he’s too tall for most shower heads hasn’t changed, but it couldn’t matter less. The water’s hot and soft and easing his muscles apart in ways he forgot were possible. He can feel the warmth shoving into his skin with eager persistence, pushing him apart and open. He’d had good showers before. Living a life that often times requires digging out a grave for three hours in the pouring rain comes with that. But this was beyond _anything_.

He’s never getting out. Ever.

It takes him thirty minutes to make himself. When he finally does it feels like he’s slept for a week. Every muscle is relaxed and open in a way they haven’t been in so long. He dries off as quickly as he can and stumbles lazily back into the main room to the smell of rabbit and soup. Apparently he’s been learning about lots of things while Sam’s out…

Lucifer eyes him as soon as he enters, “Good present?”

Sam collapses into the nearest chair, “Awesome present.”

 

Apparently the one thing hunters never run out of is booze. Lucifer keeps finding the stuff and every night there’s somehow a new bottle of vaguely identified amber liquid to pass back and forth while sleep sneaks up on them.

“What’s this one?” Lucifer asks, rolling the taste around his mouth.

Sam takes the first sip and winces, “Rum…? Maybe?”

Lucifer snorts and leans back, eyeing it with his usual care, the way he looks at most things these days, as if they have secrets that he could see if he looked in the right corners.

“What was the beginning of the world like?” Sam asks. It would have felt like a weird question a week ago, but not now. This is what they do. This is the routine.

Lucifer takes another swallow, “Bright. And loud.”

Sam snorts, “Is that all?”

“Pretty much,” Lucifer shrugs.

“How loud?” Sam asks, knowing it’s stupid but strangely enough it doesn’t feel like it. He knows it should, but here, in this place, nothing feels so stupid he can’t ask it.

“Very,” Lucifer smiles, “A sound loud enough make all of us realize that before there had been none.”

“Before when?”

“In the infinite millisecond that we existed before the rest.”

“And what was that like?”

“Vast and microscopic, forgotten and yet constant.”

“Do you like making this as difficult to understand as possible?” Sam says, rolling his eyes.

“Maybe a little,” Lucifer smiles.

For a minute Sam tries to imagine something so loud it creates sound and gives up.

“What’s ‘education’?” Lucifer asks lazily.

Sam rolls a bit to one side, “It’s… learning. Institutionalized.”

Lucifer stares at him like he doesn’t understand.

“It’s how we all learn what we need to to excel.” Sam tries, stumbling through it a bit but it’s not the hardest question he’s asked him, “why do you wear neck ties” had been considerably more difficult.

“What determines the criteria for excelling?”

“Ummm,” Sam searches, “Well, you need to know math, and how to write essays, and how Jem Finch broke his arm the summer he was fourteen.”

“How did he?”

“He fell out of a tree.” Sam says, and then squints to himself, “Or did he trip when that crazy guy was chasing them…?”

“Your education seems to serve you well,” Lucifer smirks.

“Shut up,” Sam shoots, “That’s not the point. It’s not about that really, it’s about learning.”

“And who decides what should be learnt?”

Sam sighs, “Educators, tradition mostly I guess.”

“Sounds familiar,” Lucifer sniffs.

Sam affords him a good glare.

The fire cracks and Sam fills up his glass, leaning back to watch the flames. Outside, the wind has picked up again. It howls back and forth, no doubt pushing the new powder into fresh, interesting landscapes he’ll have to navigate in the morning. He can hear the wind catch in the chimney. It’s not cold, but he sits a little closer all the same.

“Why did you fight?” Sam asks finally. His voice is quieter than he meant it to be.

“Because it’s who I am.” Lucifer says simply.

Sam tries to drink the dryness out of his mouth, “Why did you have to?”

Lucifer holds his gaze for a long time, “It’s how he made me.”

Sam doesn’t have anything to say to that, but he keeps watching him all the same.

“Can I ask you something?” Lucifer says eventually.

“Sure,” Sam answers.

“Why did he make me a solider if he didn’t want me to fight?” Lucifer asks.

He’s not looking at Sam any more, he’s staring into the fire and there’s anger licking at his gaze.

“Why would he make me strong, if he did not want me to lead? Why would be make me question if he would give no answers? And why,” his voice is sharper now, quiet still but edged, “ _Why_ would he give me love if none would accept it from me?”

Sam’s chest feels tight under his shirt. The drink’s stupid and heavy in his hand but he can’t seem to move enough to put it down.

And then Lucifer’s looking at him and for an instant Sam can’t think at all.

“Why did he make me, Sam?”

Sam blinks. There’s something hot in his throat but he swallows it down.

“I don’t know.” He says finally.

Turning away to finish his drink in one long gulp, Lucifer nods as if his answer is what he expected.

“But,” Sam hears himself say. Lucifer turns, eyes wide and heavy all at once, “It seems to me, for someone who talks about destiny as much as you do… you don’t seem to like it all that much.”

Lucifer stares back at him, quiet surprise creeping over his face until he starts to smile, weak but present.

“No, I suppose not.”

 

“I’d like to come,” Lucifer says, swinging his feet over the side of the cot as if eager to show he’s ready to leave right that minute.

Sam sighs as he pulls on the jacket, “I don’t know…”

Lucifer narrows his eyes, “I was _the_ solider of heaven, Sam, I can handle weapons.”

Sam groans because he’s really tired of this conversation but it doesn’t seem to help. He looks over at him again. He’s staring down at the floor angry and sullen.

“Okay, fine,” Sam says before he can regret it.

Lucifer’s stare tugs up from the floor to his face with a fresh shine.

“Come on,” Sam says, trying to swallow his smile, “Before I realize how stupid a choice it is to arm you.”

The snow isn’t as deep as it has been and the skies have been clear for almost a week now. There’s been more movement in the wood, things letting this streak of good weather sink into their limbs and spring them forward.

Sam glances over towards Lucifer as he takes the gun off his shoulder. He’s standing still, face lifted up towards the sky with his eyes closed, as if he’s trying to soak in the day through his skin.

“It’s warmer,” Lucifer says, opening his eyes to look at Sam, blue almost the same color of the sky, which is definitely _not_ something Sam should be noticing.

“Yeah, it’s almost spring,” Sam says, focusing on the gun in his hands instead. It’s the .038 he usually takes out, black metal knitted together into a thick weight against his hands.

“Seasons,” Lucifer lets the word roll of his tongue, “What a lovely invention.”

Sam shakes his head with a laugh, “You’re so weird,”

Lucifer looks back and him and smiles, wide and open.

“Alright, come here,” Sam says quickly, moving the gun into the right place.

Eyeing the mechanisms curiously, Lucifer steps closer. He reaches out for it. Sam grabs his wrist.

“Hold on,” Sam scolds. Lucifer’s wrist doesn't try to tug away, shifting pliantly as he nods.

Sam lets him go.

“First lesson: don’t touch a gun before you know what the hell your doing.” John’s words come out of his mouth a bit too easily, but hey, they work, “Now, I’m going to hand this to you and the first thing you’re going to do it point it _at the ground _\- never point a gun at another person, yourself included.”__

__“Unless you wish to shoot them,” Lucifer corrects._ _

__Sam sighs. “I’d really rather get through this day without bullet wounds, thanks.”_ _

__Lucifer reaches out, “Can I have it now?”_ _

__Sam laughs, “You’re such a child.” But he eases it into his hands anyways. Lucifer holds it somewhat clumsily, not like how Sam’s seen idiots who have only seen guns in movies hold them. He handles the weight like he doesn’t want to do it wrong. Lucifer gets his hands mostly in the right place, about where Sam had been holding it before he handed it over._ _

__“Now, once you pick up a gun, there are two important things to do.” Sam directs._ _

__Lucifer shifts the weigh curiously in his hands, all the while carefully keeping it pointed down as he’s been told._ _

__“First: check the safety, that’s that little button above the trigger, where your thumb is.”_ _

__Lucifer tilts the gun slightly to see better, moving his thumb curiously over the button._ _

__“How do I know if it’s ‘on’?”_ _

__“Push down,” Sam says. He does. The little button pops out slightly revealing the warning red line around the bottom, “That mean’s it off - red for danger, right?”_ _

__“Is that the usual color psychology?” Lucifer asks, pushing the button back down._ _

__“Pretty much,” Sam smiles, “So it’s on now, that’s how you want it to be.”_ _

__“What’s the function?”_ _

__“It makes sure the gun won’t go off at all, incase you drop it or something.”_ _

__“Don’t you want to gun to ‘go off’?”_ _

__“Not until _you’re_ ready.”_ _

__“I see.”_ _

__“Alright, so,” Sam says, stepping a little closer to watch his hands better, “Step two: is it loaded? Now normally this would be two steps, but this is a rifle, so it doesn’t have a magazine, that’s normally where the gun holds more bullets. But this doesn’t have one, so you just have to check the chamber. See that lever by your other hand, the part that’s sticking out like a little handle?”_ _

__“Mmm,” Lucifer notes, moving his hand to it. He’s sort of funny to watch, not exactly what Sam was expecting. He remembers watching Dean handle different weapons for the first time, hands hungry and eager to learn and accomplish. Lucifer is careful, fingers strong enough to be sure but drifting almost gracefully over the mechanisms._ _

__“Pull that back,” Sam says._ _

__Lucifer locks his hand around it and tugs it back. The chamber opens up with a shifting metallic sound._ _

__“I don’t see anything inside,” he notes._ _

__“Right, so it’s not loaded. Good.”_ _

__“So, all this care was pointless?” Lucifer asks looking up to Sam but still following his direction to keep the weapon pointed down._ _

__“It’s just basic gun safety,” Sam says, “Once you get better you can be more comfortable, but it’s dangerous. You always want to be sure you’re not endangering yourself or someone else.” That felt more like Bobby’s voice in his mouth, but he ignores that._ _

__Sam shifts and pulls a bullet out of the musty coat’s pocket, “Alright, so were going to load the gun. _Don’t lift it up_.”_ _

__Lucifer looks at Sam with more than a handful of sneer, but he manages not to roll his eyes as he takes the bullet out of his hand._ _

__“It goes in the chamber,” Sam says, “Pointed end forward.”_ _

__There’s that look again._ _

__“Good,” Sam says, ignoring his contemptuous attitude, “Then slide that forward again.”_ _

__Lucifer does, hands more confident now. The bullet snaps into the chamber with a satisfying sound. A little smile flits over his face._ _

__“May I shoot it now?”_ _

__Sam shakes his head with a smile, “Keep acting that eager about it and I’ll remember what a bad idea this is.”_ _

__Lucifer shuts his mouth._ _

__“Okay,” Sam continues. He shifts, moving behind him and stepping closer, “Lift it up and rest the barrel in your shoulder with your trigger hand, other hand supporting the weight.”_ _

__Lucifer pauses for a moment and then moves, lifting the gun up to his shoulder, standing awkward and stiff as he tries to follow instructions. It’s rigid and straight and not at all right._ _

__Sam sighs, “Here—“_ _

__He reaches up and puts a hand on each of his shoulders, shifting them into an angle. He puts a hand on the butt of the rifle and eases it back to rest against the padded muscle, inward slightly from his the joint of Lucifer's shoulder. “It’s going to kick so you want to cushion it. Does that make sense?”_ _

__Leaning in further to see Lucifer’s face and jude if he's understanding, Sam finds Lucifer’s stare is tight, directly in front of him, as if he’s trying to focus on something else._ _

__“Hey-" Sam says. His voice comes out quiet, but he’s close enough that doesn’t matter._ _

__“Yes,” Lucifer says curtly._ _

__Sam reaches down and puts a hand on his hips. He hears Lucifer’s breath catch and pulls back suddenly, but Lucifer only blinks and eases himself back a bit into his touch again._ _

__Sam swallows and turns him gently, mirroring the angle of his shoulders. He nudges a toe at the back of Lucifer’s boots and he obediently moves his leg forward._ _

__“Bend your knees a bit,” Sam says. He does._ _

__Sam looks over his shoulder to make sure everything’s lined up. Lucifer seems to get the impression, adjusting in a few small ways to pull the gun tight to his shoulder and focus through the scope._ _

__“Better?” Sam asks. He wishes his voice would stop sounding so low._ _

__Lucifer doesn’t say anything, but he edges his hips slightly and Sam only then realizes he still has a hand on them. He drops it quickly and steps away._ _

__He clears his throat. “See the cans?”_ _

__Lucifer nods ever so slightly. There’s a small line of silver cans sticking out of the snow where Sam had set them up._ _

__“Pick one out,” Sam directs. One of Lucifer’s eyes slips shut as he focuses._ _

__“Aim slightly up,” Sam says, “And when you’re ready, take off the safety, and _squeeze_ the trigger, don’t—“_ _

__The sound of the gun firing shatters through the silence of the wood._ _

__“—Pull.” Sam finishes._ _

__He stares across the snow towards the targets. One of the cans dances broken along the top of the snow, metal blown apart and peeled out like a strange silver flower._ _

__Lucifer raises his head to get a better look, smug smile spreading thick over his face._ _

__He looks over towards Sam with gleeful expectancy._ _

__Sam can’t help smiling even as he shakes his head and narrows his eyes at him, “Beginner’s luck.”_ _

__The day wears on through bright snow and quiet reminders and easy smiles. Lucifer kills things as easily as Sam does, with the same quiet considered concentration. But when they lift the dead soft shape from the ground, Sam thinks he holds it a bit tighter, looks down on it a bit longer, and there’s something struggling between cold places in his stare._ _

__

__They drink more than usual that night. Celebrating, Lucifer insists along with his first question, “isn’t that what you do?” And it is. So they do._ _

__The soup feels warm in Sam’s stomach, just like the booze on his tongue, and the fire against his knees. He leans back into his chair more, finishing his glass. He forgets if it’s the fourth or the fifth and laughs for a minute because it couldn’t matter less._ _

__“Why does the fish on the wall sing?” Lucifer asks._ _

__Sam looks over at him like he’s insane before remembering the stupid signing bass hung up by the bookcase and falling into a cough of laughter._ _

__Lucifer’s smile widens as he watches him, “What?”_ _

__“I just actually don’t know if I can answer that,” Sam says with a heavy sigh, leaning back into the wooden frame, limbs all soft and floppy with drink._ _

__“It has no explanation?” Lucifer asks._ _

__Sam’s still laughing at the question, “No, it has absolutely no explanation. It’s one of those timeless questions.”_ _

__Lucifer smirks, “Like the meaning of life?”_ _

__“Exactly,” Sam says shifting up and pointing enthusiastically, “Exactly like that.”_ _

__Lucifer shakes his head and mutters something into his glass which Sam could almost swear is _“humans”_ , but he’s smiling, so Sam doesn’t press it._ _

__“My turn?” Sam asks, rolling his head over._ _

__Lucifer looks back at him, as if to say “of course”._ _

__Sam squints into the fire, trying to think of something as good as the fish, but there’s nothing quite that awesome so he’s quiet for a long time._ _

__“You said things,” Sam says suddenly, words falling out before the question’s even reached his head, “While you were… sick,” It’s a stupid word, that doesn’t work at all, but it’s the one that finds it’s way out._ _

__Lucifer seems surprised, “Did I? What did I say?”_ _

__Sam leans his head back trying to remember._ _

__“Dumah,” he says, the word coming clear, “You kept saying it: dumah.”_ _

__Lucifer’s look darkens, eyes pulling down and away._ _

__“Is it enchocian?” Sam asks._ _

__“Yes.”_ _

__“What does it mean?”_ _

__Lucifer takes a long sip, “Silence.”_ _

__“Silence?”_ _

__Lucifer nods._ _

__Sam realizes he’s gone quiet, sees that he’s pulled back, and if Sam was thinking a little better he would have stopped there, but the warmth slung over him is too comfortable to stop the words from slipping free._ _

__“What does that mean?”_ _

__Lucifer’s stare against the fire tightens, and for a minute Sam thinks he won’t answer, but then he turns and the blue eyes meet his._ _

__“There’s silence now, where there wasn’t before. Vast, horrible silence,” he’s staring into Sam’s eyes like he’s the only solid thing in the world, “And sometimes, in the dark, I’m still terrified of it.”_ _

__Sam holds his gaze, “I don’t understand.”_ _

__Lucifer sighs and leans back, “There’s a sound to existence Sam, a hum almost. In heaven my brother’s voices joined with it creating a chorus that was constant and glorious.”_ _

__Lucifer rolls the glass between his fingers, brow tight against the memories._ _

__“When I was cast out I lost their voices. It was… a deep wound. It felt as if a part of my mind had been sliced away. But there was still the hum, the presence of the constant sound of existence. I was still an angel after all.”_ _

__Sam knows there’s heat from the fire licking against his knees, but he hardly feels it._ _

__“And now,” he asks._ _

__Lucifer turns to him, and it’s that look again, as it had been in the broken mirror and the yellow fluorescent light that very first night._ _

__“Silence,” he says, “Just silence.”_ _

__Sam wants to say something. He wants to fill up the empty gaping space that just makes the thought of it worse, but nothing comes, just the weight of the words and the impossible imagining flooding his mind._ _

__“My turn?” Lucifer asks, voice breaking through the quiet._ _

__Sam nods and takes another sip._ _

__Lucifer’s quiet for a long moment, small crinkle in his forehead as if he’s trying to make something impossible fit together._ _

__“How do you fall?” he asks._ _

__Sam turns. “What?”_ _

__Lucifer’s staring back at him, confusion still written in the angles of his face, “You do it so easily. It’s like you were made for it. I’ve seen you, you stumble and your whole body, it moves without you telling it to.”_ _

__Lucifer smiles lightly but it’s bitter on the edges._ _

__“It’s beautiful, really - all those muscles, small and large, moving so suddenly and intelligently to catch yourself, to cushion the inevitable crash… You’re full of grace in your own way, in those moments more than any others, when you think you lack it the most. I’ve never had that instinct.”_ _

__He looks up meeting Sam’s stare again._ _

__“How do you do it, Sam?”_ _

__He’s looking at him like Sam can answer him, like Sam knows and Lucifer’s positive he will tell him. Or maybe it’s not that… maybe it’s hope._ _

__Sam swallows. His throat’s dry and suddenly the fire feels too hot._ _

__“I… I don’t know,” He says finally._ _

__There’s disappointment but it’s brief, as if Lucifer tries to push it away so Sam can’t see. He leans back into the chair._ _

__“I don’t think we were built for it,” Lucifer says quietly, “We were made to soar, not to fall, and perhaps that’s what makes it so hard.”_ _

__Sam wants to look away too, move on, forget it. But apparently he’s not great at that._ _

__“What about flying?” He asks._ _

__Lucifer glances over at him. “What about it?”_ _

__“How do you do that?”_ _

__Lucifer laughs, a small breathy chuckle as if Sam has no idea how complicated what he’s asking is, “You shouldn’t ask me, I was never very good at it.”_ _

__“Really?” Sam asks, “I thought you were, you know… the best.”_ _

__Lucifer grins like Sam is intentionally complimenting him, “I was very strong, but I could never fly properly. Not like Michael, or even Castiel. Flight is all about faith. The stronger your faith the stronger your wings. I compensated in other ways.”_ _

__“Like what?”_ _

__“Original thinking is highly underestimated by the angelic force.”_ _

__“Ah,” Sam smiles taking another sip._ _

__He’s quiet for a moment._ _

__“Maybe it’s like that though, falling.”_ _

__Lucifer looks to him, “What do you mean?”_ _

__“I mean you have to have faith, too. If your body didn’t think it could save itself, it wouldn’t try to…”_ _

__“Its still faith—” Lucifer insists._ _

__“Yeah, but not the same. I don’t know, but with flying it seems like it’s about thinking something won’t let you fall. With falling it’s faith in yourself, in your own effort to not break.”_ _

__“But you can be wrong,” Lucifer says, “You can break.”_ _

__“At least we try. There’s got to be something said for that, right?”_ _

__Lucifer stares at him. It’s the same look he’d given the glass of whiskey the first time, as if he could see the structure if he looked hard enough, as if there were unseen pieces he didn’t understand but wanted desperately to put together, “Yes, there is.”_ _

__Sam looks away, trying his best to shove the creeping heat in his stomach away as he adjusts in the chair._ _

__Lucifer smiles as he turns back to his own seat._ _

__Sam swirls the auburn liquid around his glass and the thoughts around his mind. They don’t seem to want to stick, so he just allows them to slip out where they want to. It’s worked so far._ _

__“You said I looked different,” Sam says, “When you woke up. What did you mean?”_ _

__It’s his turn after all, he can ask whatever he wants._ _

__Lucifer eyes him, “You’re tall.’_ _

__“Yeah, but I’ve always been tall,” Sam laughs._ _

__Lucifer gives him a pitying look, “Not to me.”_ _

__“But I am now?”_ _

__“I notice it now.” Lucifer smiles to himself as if it still confuses him but not in a totally unpleasant way, “You’re… different. I can’t see your soul anymore.”_ _

__Sam suddenly leans over, attention pretty efficiently pulled in, “You could see my soul.”_ _

__“All angels can, it’s sort of what we do.” Lucifer says, “Haven’t you noticed the way Castiel stares at your brother? I thought it was rather rude, personally, but—”_ _

__“Hold on, Cas is look at his soul?!” Sam’s hooked now. If Dean were there he’d never stop teasing him for what he’d probably call ‘a massive research erection’._ _

__“And yours.” Lucifer says, “We can all see souls. They are more unique than appearances in many ways,”_ _

__“Yeah, but how?” Sam presses, inching forward, “I mean, do you see us, or is it like that mind reading thing, or what?”_ _

__Lucifer’s obviously enjoying himself, “We still see you, your physical appearance, but the soul slinks through all of that, and the shape of your thoughts and your mind, it all comes together into a fairly concise impression.”_ _

__He looks up at Sam, “It’s very beautiful. But angels are like you in some ways I suppose, we all have our tastes. Some souls shine brighter for some angels. Castiel finds Dean intriguing in a way that I don't, if I had to give an example.”_ _

__“And you don’t see that now? My soul, mind shape, whatever?” Sam says._ _

__“No,” Lucifer says, with a hint of disappointment._ _

__Sam smirks as he leans back, “No so beautiful then, huh?”_ _

__Lucifer smiles, “It’s different.”_ _

__Sam lets his head roll over and the room swims a bit. He should probably stop drinking. He probably should have stopped about an hour ago._ _

__“Different how?” Sam asks._ _

__Lucifer turns to look at him better, “I can still see it in a way, but it’s strange. Different. I used to see it, and feel it, and know it was beautiful in a way totally unlike anything else. And I still know that, but the _feel_ is different.”_ _

__Sam swallows and tries not to close his eyes to hear him better._ _

__“It’s deep,” Lucifer says, “In a place I’m not sure I knew before. And warm, and so… focused. It feels stronger in some places, as if all that hidden beauty is caught in bent angles where you wouldn’t expect to find it.”_ _

__Sam wants to laugh but he doesn’t. Lucifer’s voice sounds nice a little slurred, close, and quiet._ _

__“Like where?” Sam asks sleepily._ _

__Lucifer holds his eyes for a moment and then lets his stare drift, and it’s such a strong presence that Sam can almost feel it. He’s staring at him, all the little parts of him like he’s wanted to do just that for months, years._ _

__His hand drifts up leisurely, and he holds it still in the air between them for a moment like an unspoken question. But Sam says nothing. He’s not sure he could if he wanted to, and then Lucifer’s thumb is drifting over his wrist._ _

__“Here,” he says, eyes heavy as he watches his own touch on his hand._ _

__Sam can’t say anything._ _

__Lucifer shifts, leaning closer, moving his hand slowly, carefully, like something might reach out to a bird on a branch._ _

__His finger grazes Sam’s shoulder, right where the muscles of his neck fold into his collar bone, “Here.”_ _

__Sam thinks his eyes might be closed, they must be, the room’s too distant and the feeling on booze on his tongue’s too strong._ _

__The hand is gone and then it’s back, easing the fabric of his shirt up just slightly to ghost against the skin of his hip where it falls into his jeans._ _

__“And here,” Lucifer murmurs._ _

__Sam swallows against the gentle, barely-present heat of it. And then the hand is gone._ _

__Perhaps Sam opens his eyes a little too fast, but Lucifer doesn’t seem to notice, fingers calm around his glass as he stares languidly at the fire._ _

__They end up finishing the bottle._ _

__Sam’s hardly conscious by the time he hits the floor next to the cot and judging by Lucifer’s heavy, steady breathing, he’s well ahead of him._ _

__He’s still half laughing to himself about something and before he can remember what it is, he’s asleep._ _

__

__The cold wakes him somewhere in the middle of the night. The cabin is shrouded in darkness, the shadowed shapes of the chairs by the fire the only thing clearly visible._ _

__He hears muttered words behind him._ _

__With a shiver, he rolls to his side, lifting himself out of the sleeping bag to look over at the cot. Lucifer’s twitching in his sleep, small frightened sounds slipping out of him every few seconds._ _

__Sam squints and then he’s standing._ _

__He walks over to the cot and half stumbles to onto it. It’s warm. He’d known it would be warm._ _

__It hardly takes a tug to pull half of the blanket over his shoulders and sink into the sag of the canvas. Lucifer is stiller now, but sounds escaping him as weak, trembling things._ _

__Sam’s still too drunk to make sense of that, and he’s tired. He’s so tired. And he’s warm._ _

__He puts a hand on Lucifer’s shoulder and the trembling stills, the mutters die away and calm, steady breaths take their place. Sam’s already asleep again._ _

__Somewhere caught between foggy dreams his hand slips down to Lucifer’s side and he feels a body push back ever so slightly into his. But it’s just a dream. He’s sure of that._ _

__

__For the first time since they’ve been there Sam wakes to sun hard on his face._ _

__He sits up blearily staring around the cabin. It’s late. He can tell easily enough. It’s probably the latest he’s ever woken up here. His head gives a sharp throb and he groans and falls back onto the pillows, remembering _why_ he probably slept in. _ _

__“Hey,” he calls, realizing his voice sounds like something that crawled out of a cave._ _

__No response._ _

__He rolls his head to look around. The boots are gone, and the coat. The fire’s stoked. Someone’s left a bowl of oatmeal out on the desk close enough for him to reach._ _

__Sam falls back again, rubbing his eyes to try and wake up._ _

__He glances over towards the far wall and sees that stupid singing bass and can’t help smiling. He’s about to glance away but suddenly something else catches his eye._ _

__There’s something else on the wall._ _

__It looks like a line, a thin red line peeking out from behind the big bookcase. Sam squints at it and then, carefully, and not without punishment from his aching head, he stands and walks towards it._ _

__He kneels down. It’s definitely a line, something carved into the wall that loops behind the bookcase and out of sight. How’s he never noticed it before?_ _

__Sam tries to peer behind it but it’s too close to the wall, so with a sigh he stands, braces himself against the side and gives it a careful push. It moves with surprising ease._ _

__There’s more lines, lots more, and he doesn’t stop until the bookcase is almost five feet from where it was and the whole intricate display is revealed._ _

__He takes two steps back, and stares._ _

__It’s a ward, a ward unlike anything he’s ever seen._ _

__A shiver snakes up his back and he tries to ignore the tight sickness forming in his stomach because it all makes sense now: Cas’ confusion, the reason he couldn’t see them, the reason why it seems like _nothing_ can see them._ _

__The ward is immense, tiny lines scrawled into every centimeter of what could easily be four feet in diameter. And it’s not just carved. Someone’s painted blood into every tiny line, turning the whole thing a dark, rotten red._ _

__Sam steps back, turning away, shutting his eyes tight and trying to make sense of this. But it already makes too much sense. He opens them again and turns, but this time his eyes catch on something else._ _

__Ruby’s knife is stuck in the wall where he left it. It’s next to lines carved in the wood. Lines marking the days. He can’t remember the last time he made one._ _

__Sam’s moving before he can think, snatching the knife out of the wood and turning towards the ward. He’s at it in two quick steps, knife ready, tip pointed out ready to scratch away, somewhere, anywhere._ _

__But he doesn’t._ _

__He stares at his hand, the knife, the ward so close, so easy to tear a seam in that would fix all of this. Still. Nothing._ _

__He drops the knife to the ground with a loud clatter and follows it, collapsing down and leaning against the wall with his head in his hands._ _

__He takes a deep breath, then another, and with his head leant back against the wall and his heart pounding in his chest, Sam waits._ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Adam and Raphael really do have a sex talk in Paradise Lost. It's the best.
> 
> ANYWAYS THEOLOGY: I have always had a hard time mentally reconciling "Paradise Lost" Lucifer and "Supernatural" Lucifer, so my take is that the Paradise Lost events happened, i.e. god said "his son" (not a human) was taking over heaven, lucifer fought, etc, then he went back to try and claim earth and everything went to hell, and Supernatural Lucifer reflects that maintained goal and a more recent hatred for human kind in the face of his failure in the garden...


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> COME A LITTLE CLOSER
> 
> "There's a Halo in your mouth,  
> and I like how it burns."
> 
> [ \- Joanna ](http://sincerelyjoanna.tumblr.com/post/49126714074)

He doesn’t have to wait long sitting there with his back against the carved patterns of the sigil. The sun’s hardly crept across the floor at all when he hears something shifting in the snow outside. 

The sound of it crashes in on him suddenly and he shakes himself, realizing he’s been staring at the same place on the floor all this while. It feels as if he’s been thinking but now he can’t seem to remember what about. All he remembers is the feeling of carved ward under his head and the hot anger making his hands shake just slightly and his stomach feel two sizes too tight inside him.

He stands up on uneasy legs as Lucifer opens the door.

Lucifer’s smiling as he shuts the door, the gun over his shoulder, some sort of bird in one of his hands. He’s wearing the moldy old coat and his ears are red with cold, hair knocked around untidily. He turns to Sam with an expectant grin only to see his expression and stop. The smile vanishes from his face.

Sam stares back at him hard as he can manage. He can still feel tremors in his hands so he crosses his arms tightly in front of his chest.

The movement gives Lucifer time to take it all in, the pushed bookcase, the sigil, Sam. With a sigh, he turns to shrug off the coat and boots.

“Are you going to hit me again?” He asks, voice trying for casual and only half making it.

Sam’s trying his best not to cross the room in two steps, snatch his collar and turn him around to face him. He’s trying. But the heat of fury is licking up his throat and making it harder than it should be to resist the inclination to violence.

“Did you do this?” Sam says.

Lucifer still isn’t facing him, hanging the coat up where it belongs. “No.”

Sam snorts, a hard and bitter exhalation. “And why should I believe that?”

Lucifer turns at the accusatory tone, his stare stone-cold, something dangerous flickering in his eyes. “I told you I would not lie to you.”

Sam’s arms shoot away from his chest all at once, gesturing wide and frantic, “Oh! That’s fine, that’s totally fine, so there just _happens_ to be an impossibly complex sigil _carved into the wall of our cabin_ and Castiel just _happens_ to be unable to find us!”

“I never implied it was coincidental.” Lucifer says, stepping closer. “Serendipitous, to be sure, but—“

Sam’s laughing again, short and hard and he hates the taste of it but he can’t stop himself; “Why the hell should I believe you?”

Lucifer’s looking at him in that way again, that stupid way he always looks at him only he actually manages to almost seem hurt, sad, as if he was even capable of that. Sam finds himself stepping closer, close enough to shove him away and make him stop looking at him like that, but he can’t quite complete the action.

“Why should I believe you?” He repeats, voice knife sharp.

“I wouldn’t lie to you, Sam.” Lucifer says. He says it simply. As if it’s just that easy.

Sam turns away, shaking his head and running his hand up through his hair hard enough to hurt.

“Castiel couldn’t find us long before I was conscious enough to do such a thing.” Lucifer says, gesturing to the wall, “You know that.”

Sam does know. Cas couldn’t find them at all, right from the moment they got there. But that doesn’t mean…

“You knew,” Sam says, turning, “You might not have carved it, but you knew this was here. Didn’t you?”

Lucifer doesn’t look away from his eyes, “Yes. I knew.”

Sam grits his teeth and turns away. He can’t look at him. Not with his face like that, as though he cares about how furious Sam is, like he’s sorry he caused it and wishes he could stop it and doesn’t care about anything else but that.

“You didn’t tell me,” Sam says, voice low, “All this time, you sat there, and you knew that this was here, and that this was the reason we’ve been trapped and you said _nothing!_ ”

Lucifer’s voice is closer, Sam can almost feel him standing behind him, “Yes.”

Sam spins on him, “How could you do that? You lied to me!”

“I never lied to you,” Lucifer says as if it’s the only truth in the world.

“It’s the same thing!” Sam yells, “It’s exactly the same, you just don’t want to admit it! How much else? How much else have you omitted or adjusted or forgotten to mention? Has _any_ of this been the truth? What have you twisted and turned to work the way you wanted it to!?”

“Nothing—“ Lucifer starts with a blink, voice dry suddenly, lost on the edges. He grits his teeth as if to push that away and when his voice comes back it’s tinted with rage, “I have not lied to you. I _will not lie to you_.”

“I don’t want to hear it,” Sam snaps, turning his back again and pacing across the room, “I don’t want to hear anything from you. Ever. Do you understand?”

Lucifer says nothing.

Sam feels his own hand tight enough to hurt against his scalp. Why won’t it stop shaking?

“Sam,” the voice comes.

Sam shuts his eyes tight as he can, as if that will stop the sound from reaching him.

“Sam?” closer now. 

The grit to Lucifer’s voice is gone, the anger sunken into quiet confusion.

“Why are we still here?” Lucifer asks.

Something raw tries to scramble out of Sam throat but he catches it and shoves it back down.

“The ward—”

“Shut up-” Sam warns.

But he doesn’t shut up, and now the voice is ever closer.

“You could have broken it. Why didn’t you break it?”

“Shut up!” Sam yells. He spins to face him and there’s nothing, nothing but the blue of his eyes staring back, full of that thing Sam can’t place, doesn’t want to place.

“Do you think it’s that easy?” 

Sam’s voice sounds broken in his ears, but it can’t be, he won’t let it, so he forces it into anger: “Do you think this is all it takes?”

Sam steps back, looking around the room, the books, the plates, the cans, the coat, the stupid cot by the wall with the blanket slumped to the side, and the he’s laughing, holding himself up against the wooden back of one chair and laughing.

“You think that’s it? That if I make you soup and we have some drinks that this will all be just fine? Like I’m not who I am? Like you’re not who, _what_ you are? You think that’s even possible?”

Lucifer says nothing, but Sam won’t look at him. He won’t.

“You think I’d be that weak?” Sam says, “Again?” 

He looks down at his own knuckles tight against the wood. There’s small circles on the knuckles, broken skin still healing from where he hit him weeks ago. His eyes feel hot, so he shuts them, but it only makes it worse.

“Sam…”

Sam looks. 

It’s everything he expect. Lucifer looks small. And afraid. And so very lost.

“Everything else hates you,” Sam whispers, “Why shouldn’t I?”

Lucifer stares at him and then blinks hard. He shakes his head, “I don’t know.” 

Sam thinks for a moment that Lucifer’s hands might be shaking as hard as his own.

“But I want to believe you don’t,” Lucifer says. 

He’s staring out in front of him, not at Sam, just into the air between them, as if something invisible is coming to life in front of him, “I need to believe in something. I need to… to hope.”

And at his own words his brow furrows as if didn’t know they came from him.

Sam stares at him. Standing there, it’s as if he can see all these weeks piled up around him. The way he’d looked collapsed in the snow, broken and useless. How’d he’d turned to him in the sickly yellow light of the bathroom, blue eyes caught in the broken mirror with the smell of electricity and blood all around. He can see the rage lighting up his eyes as he swung for him, he can see his hand snatching out in the dark, locking on his wrist hard enough the bruise. He can see him laughing at his questions. He can see him smiling bright against the snow. He can feel his body warm under his hands through the coat as Sam tilted his shoulders to bring the gun home, feel the tips of his fingers ghosting over his wrist.

He can see the day markers carved on the wall. He sees his phone dead and forgotten on the desk beside him. He thinks of Dean and the expression on his face floods Sam’s mind like a torrent. It’s an expression Sam promised himself he would never, ever deserve again.

He’s walking across the room quickly, shouldering past Lucifer and towards the door. His hand grabs the handle.

“Sam-“

“Don’t follow me.” And the door is shut behind him.

The air hits him warm and heavy and he heads deeper into it, towards the lake, the woods, anything, just away, away, _away_. 

He’s walking, not thinking. Definitely not thinking. Not until he’s well away from the look on his face and the sound of his voice. 

It’s warmer than it has been since they’ve gotten there by what must be at least ten degrees. He doesn’t have his jacket and certainly doesn’t need it, the fresh wind catching up under his hair and attempting to push the thoughts away from him.

He keeps walking, pushing through the snow towards the trees, towards anything really, whatever happens to hit him first.

Even as he carries on, he struggles to clear his head, shove everything out of it and hope that maybe once it's in the open air it might have the chance to form some useful pattern, but it won’t budge. He can’t shake the catch in Lucifer’s voice or the memory of Dean’s face or so much else, and finally he just stops.

His chest is still heaving. He’s walked further than he thought. 

Now he can tell he’s gone east, rather than west towards the wood. There’s a bend to the edge of the lake here and he can’t see the cabin any longer, which instantly lifts weight from his shoulders. He tilts his head back to try to breathe more steadily.

There’s a rock jutting out of the snow near the bank of the lake. The lake is still submerged in white, ice waiting under at least six inches of snow, but the rock is clear after the recent warmth so he sits, focusing on the rise and fall of his chest, letting his fingers catch cold on the grainy stone under him as his mind attempts to slip into calm again.

But it’s a challenge. More than it should be.

What did he expect? It shouldn’t feel like the blow it does. He shouldn’t feel surprised to be betrayed or used or lost, and maybe he doesn’t… maybe it just himself he’s disappointed in. Again. And for what?

Because he didn’t tell him? Because he lied to him, no matter what he says?

 _Why?_

The question is stuck in Sam’s head and he doesn’t quite understand it. There’s a simple answer: because it’s Lucifer. 

But that answer gets stuck, like a peg fitting into the wrong hole. It’s that idea again, that ambiguous shape of The Devil that he can’t quite make, well, Lucifer, fit into. He knows they are the same thing, they have to be, but the Lucifer behind him, with the desperate hope glittering under the anger in his eyes and the coat that’s torn over one shoulder and pulled tight against the cold… why would he hide the sigil on the wall?

_Because he’s afraid._

The answer comes stark and simple. 

_Because he didn’t know what would happen. Because he doesn’t trust you._

Is that what stung? Was that the bitter taste lingering in the back of his throat? Lucifer didn’t tell him because he thought that Sam would destroy it, cut a neat line across the ward and bring Cas and Dean right to them in an instant. And of course he would. 

But he hadn’t, had he?

Sam groans and slips his head into his hands, tightening his fingers into his hair until the sting sparks against his scalp.

Why was this so hard? 

Suddenly something Cas said once flitted across his mind. Something about what angels are, light and folded space. And love. He said angels were made of God’s Love. It was what they were formed from, what kept them alive…

But Lucifer doesn’t have that anymore, does he?

Sam suddenly wonders what that must feel like, to be denied the very thing that defines you. Does it leave a hole, something gaping and open that is desperate to be filled, or does it just remove a foundation, leaving a shell to crumble slowly against the elements?

He tries to imagine that feeling, the feeling of having the thing that matters most to you ripped away and thrown aside. He imagines Dean helpless, Dean unable to give himself for the people he cares about. He thinks of their dad without a weapon, without the means to hunt his monsters down. He can’t. They would die first, anything before that. They would never stop, never give up, but that’s because they had control. What would it be like to have no control? To have something beyond powerful rip the love that forms your very being away from you?

Would it make you a monster? No. A ghost. Wandering, lost and desperate and full of rage. It would break you. 

But Lucifer hadn’t broken, had he? He was still standing, barely, but there nonetheless, with an old coat and the smell of wood stove on his hands, and there was something sort of amazing about that, something incredible. Something familiar.

Sam looks out over the lake to where the trees snatch up the white and the mountains behind them take the burden even further. He feels a small breeze catch over his skin and looks up the the sky. Despite the warmth, it’s still grey, clouded smoothed across the sky in even, feathery brush strokes.

With a deep breath, he stands up and closes his eyes.

Lucifer had said he’d been falling for a long time. He’d said he’d thought Sam would catch him. He said he’d missed. But Sam wonders if maybe he didn’t, if maybe one finger caught him as he passed, the edge of his shirt, the bend of his wrist, a snatch of his hair, and tugged him along for the ride. Because Sam feels like he’s the one falling now… only in a much more familiar and a much more dangerous way.

He can still feel his hands shaking slightly at his sides as he turns and heads back towards the cabin.

The first ten steps are slow, and the next ten are faster, pushing him across the snowy surface of the lake to cut the corner and see the familiar slant of the roof peaking around the treetops. Sam stops once it’s in sight.

Lucifer’s out front by the lake as if he started to follow Sam and stopped himself. He’s kneeling down, looking at the snow and ice under him.

Sam watches him for a moment and then starts walking again, “Hey!”

Lucifer’s head shoots up, and Sam’s just close enough to see the blue sharp against the grey of the day. There’s a moment of confusion on Lucifer’s face and then theres’ nothing but panic and he’s on his feet.

“SAM, WAIT-“

It doesn’t crack.

For half a second Sam thinks that’s strange. Ice is supposed to crack. But then there’s nothing, nothing but the cold.

It shoots through him all at once, covering him up, pushing him down, brutal, and heavy, and cold. So very cold. Knives shooting up into his skin, shoving messily down his throat as he gasps his surprise.

He can’t think. There’s nothing but the ice and the dull green blue light all around that’s slipping further into black. 

_Move - you have to move—_

It’s hard, it’s impossible but he fights it anyways, kicking and struggling to escape the darkness that’s catching at his ankles. The boots are heavy on his feet and he tries to get them off but the laces are tight and up above him there’s only a crisscross of white lines, no hole, no break.

He has to breathe again, has to gasp, his lungs feel ten times too small. The ice is like steel rods in his ears, in his nostrils, the boots lead on his feet. The world is nothing but fuzzy shades of green, losing shape, losing meaning. But he can’t hold out any longer-

The panic catches in him because this is it, he’s going to drown, in a lake, in the middle of nowhere, after everything, after all they’ve been through, _and there’s nothing he can do to stop it_.

He kicks as hard as he can with the last he has, but it’s not enough, and blinding pain in his lungs is too much--

He gasps and the ice pours in, ripping down his throat with greedy haste, and then the darkness is everywhere, and he doesn’t know if he’s moving anymore except for down, down, down.

Somewhere far away hard fingers close around his wrist and he isn’t falling any longer.

There’s a rush of space, something knocks against him, hard and cold and then the heaviness changes. Everything around him is light everything against him is heavy, his clothes like frozen steel, his body weighted and impossible. But it’s still dark, and everything else is drifting away.

Something’s close, warm where nothing else is. There’s a voice. He recognizes it and doesn’t. It sounds like Dean when Sam was on his knees in the mud with a sliver of pain folded between his shoulder blades. It sounds terrified. 

But Dean isn’t here. 

_“Sam, I don’t know what to do. You have to tell me what to do.”_

There’s a bite of anger there, a silvery slice through the terror. Sam wants to help. He wants to help anything that sounds that lost. But it’s so dark, and he’s so cold. It’s getting harder to hear and he doesn’t remember how to breathe.

_“You can’t just-- don’t…“_

The anger is sharper now, smothering the rest. _Dad’s voice._

In another world far away there’s a mouth on his, pushing his lips apart, air pressing against his tongue. But Sam can’t feel it here, all this way away, air is useless here… And then the air stops, and there’s just a shaking head pressed to his, something wet and so hot against the icy cage of his skin. 

The lips press again, and again, closed now. Sam can hardly feel them, the sensation slipping apart, drifting down into the dark like everything else. 

There’s a voice, so soft, and so close.

_“Please.”_

It’s just a word, but he tastes it. He feels the breathe of it against his lips, but he knows, he knows the word is not meant for him, and suddenly, it catches fire.

The vibration of it thrums, sinking deep and echoing through his mind.

_Please, please, please-_

He can feel it pulsing through his chest, his brain, every inch of him, and he feels the response even if there are no words.

Lucifer gasps. 

Sam wants to open his eyes, he wants to breathe again, but he can’t he just can’t. The terror suddenly wraps around him, smothering, pushing the darkness deeper, heavier until it’s not just darkness any longer it’s _nothingnothingnothing._

And then everything gets very warm.

There’s the press of lips against his, urging his open, pushing in the air… no, not air, something else, something on fire. The the smell of electricity and blood is all around, a smell he knows from nightmare clogged nights and a fluorescent lit bathroom with a broken mirror.

Heat sparks against his tongue, brilliant and alive and impossible and Sam cowers—

_“I can’t, I can’t.”_

_“Please, Sam, please-”_

The sensation is filling each cell with lightning, making his skin dance, numb and not all at once. It’s hot, no, _cold_ \- so cold it burns. It pushes against the back of his throat, eager, desperate, struggling against him to be let in, to be accepted. In the back of his mind, through the straining dark Sam feels himself sob.

_“It’s not mine. I can’t.”_

The icy fire of it stills in his mouth, licking around the edges, halting it’s urgent press against his throat. Cold hands slink up into his ice heavy hair, holding Sam’s head gently, firmly, like a promise and a plea all at once.

_“It has always been yours.”_

Sam feels his body loosen, his head settles limp against the hands that hold it, his limbs lose their rigidity, the press of darkness against his eyes eases. 

Sam opens to it, and suddenly, there’s nothing but light.

It pours down his throat like liquid gold, burning and yet warm, freezing and yet cool, and so bright color seems like something simple. He can feel it slipping like silver threads of molten metal through each vein, every nerve. It hurts and doesn’t. It’s numb and beyond not. It thrums and hums through him as if it’s home, curious and starving and still so afraid. 

He feels each and every inch of his body as he never has before, he feels each muscle tightening and loosening, and it only grows. He can feel the cells pushing against each other, vibrating together and filling with light. He can taste each molecule of air slipping down his throat, feel the push of his atoms easing into the floor under him, the body above him, the air around them, and everything else onward, forever and ever, into the infinite constant of connection, and it’s too much, everything, and nothing, and more than anyone has ever know. There’s a song in his ears that he can barely hear.

Sam gasps and coughs at once. There’s water on his face. He might think he coughed it up, if he could think that is.

He collapses back, solid and present against the dull wood floor of the cabin. 

His hand falls down at his side. Why does he think it was holding onto something, someone… Why can he still feel short hair tinged with static pricking against his fingertips...

Sam feels the simple weight of the boards under him, the plain chill of his wet clothes on his body. His lungs ache slightly with each breath. But he breathes, and after hardly a moment, he sleeps.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am not the first person you loved.  
>  You are not the first person I looked at  
> With a mouthful of forevers. We  
> Have both known loss like the sharp edges  
> Of a knife. We have both lived with lips  
> More scar tissue than skin. Our love came  
> Unannounced in the middle of the night.  
> Our love came when we'd given up   
> On asking for love to come. I think  
> That has to be part of it's miracle.
> 
> This is how we heal.  
> I will kiss you like forgiveness. You  
> Will hold me like I'm hope. Our arms  
> Will bandage and we will press promises  
> Between us like flowers in a book.  
> I will write sonnets to the salt of sweat  
> On your skin. I will write novels to the scar  
> Of your nose. I will write a dictionary  
> Of all the words i have used trying  
> To describe the way it feels to have finally,  
> Finally found you.
> 
> And I will not be afraid  
> Of your scars.
> 
> I know sometimes  
> It's still hard to let me see you  
> In all you cracked perfection,  
> But please know:  
> Whether it's the days you burn  
> More brillant than the sun  
> Or the nights you collapse into my lap  
> Your body broken into a thousand questions.  
> You are the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.  
> I will love you when you are a still day.  
> I will love you when you are a hurricane.
> 
> —Clementine von Radics, Mouthful of Forevers

_Falling—_

The air rips past him faster and faster. He tries to scream, he wants to scream, but each breath pushes heat from his body. When he gasps to catch it back, cold buries itself deep in his chest and there’s not even the memory of warmth.

It’s silent all around, and he doesn’t know why that makes him sob. But the tears don’t touch his cheeks, merely rip away into the rushing air, tossed aside along with everything else. 

He knows he must stop eventually. It should terrify him. But it doesn’t. 

He’s desperate for it, begging for it, anything but this, anything but the endless tumbling uncertainty.

There’s a voice against his tongue that’s not his own.

_Please—_

Sam wakes up.

There’s the wood grain pattern of a wall in front of his face, swept into swirling patterns and twisted knots. He feels the sag of a cot under him and a blanket draped across his form. It smells of damp and dust. 

He shuts his eyes again, tighter this time, and rolls over onto his back.

With certainty, he could recall at least one thing; he fell into the lake. The ice had been thick enough to walk on the whole winter, but with the way the weather had been warming up, it must have gone soft in places. He’d fallen into the lake, and Lucifer had pulled him out. He’d been unconscious, maybe more than unconscious. And then it had all gone weird. And now he was here…

Other memories float haphazardly into reach: the smell of electricity, a hand in his wet hair, cold, ice, heat, a voice whispering _‘please’_.

He opens his eyes again and tries to move. It’s easier than he’d imagined it would be, shockingly so. Normally, when he wakes up hazy like this after near-death experiences, moving means punishment. He fully expects to feel the burn of damaged muscles, aching bones, flesh not yet repaired. But there's nothing of the sort. He feels good. Great, in fact.

It’s not as comforting as it should be.

With a groan, he sits up all the way and looks around, at the cabin, at himself.

He’s dressed, well, halfway, just as he always is when he goes to sleep. The cabin looks the same. No… usual, not the same. The bookcase is back where it should be, only a few stray lines of the ward peering out from behind it. Sam looks away.

The stove is lit. The kitchen is tidy. There’s a glass of water next to him.

He looks towards the door. The coat is gone, and the spare boots. He sees his own shoes lines up neatly against the wall.

Carefully, he swings his legs over the side of the bed and stands. His jeans and his flannel are folded over the back of a desk chair so he reaches for them and pulls them on slowly, still not used to the fact that none of this hurts.

He knows there’s a lot here. He knows he should be confused, terrified, lost. He knows he shouldn’t feel as calm as he does. 

The best thing to do would be to think, eat, sort through, suss out, something. But instead he finds himself crossing the quiet warm space of the cabin and tugging on his boots.

It’s warm outside, still. The air is light and the sky is brilliantly pale blue and clear as anything. He squints briefly as he walks the first few feet. The snow doesn’t seem as deep as it has in weeks, months hence. It’s thicker, snuggled down into itself under its own weight. The spans of white aren’t the vast smooth planes any longer, they’re lumpy and uneven, hinting at the terrain underneath.

Sam walks past the lake, stopping for a moment to see the gaping hole about twenty feet from the shore. It hasn’t sealed shut yet. He wonders briefly just how soon ‘yet’ is before turning back and continuing walking.

The air smells of pine and melted snow. The slight breeze feels warm and pleasant under his hair and against his cheeks.

There are footprints in front of his, but he doesn’t look to them. He knows where he’s going. He doesn’t know how, he just… knows. And somehow that isn’t terrifying either.

The ledge is easier to climb than it had been the first time. The dense snow allows stronger footholds and the shallower depth of it makes the rocks and breaks between them easier to see. The woods feel more alive as well, the bird songs seemingly doubled, the scampering noises in the brush far more present all around him. The trees begin to thin as the climb starts to level under his feet.

He’d been exhausted the first time, but he wasn’t now. He’s taken his time, somehow not feeling the need to rush. The rocks begin to flatten off and he knows it’s only a few more steps.

Sam pushes upwards, pulling himself the last few feet to the top of the ledge. He stands, looks, and all at once he’s breathless.

Lucifer is standing there, as Sam knew he would be. His back is turned to Sam, face towards the valley and the sunlight spreading down into it. Sam can just see the edge of his jaw and the corner of his eye. He can see the bend of his back, the slope of his shoulders under the heavy old coat. He can see all of that, but in that moment he doesn’t, because all he can see is something else.

At first it’s almost a shimmer, like a reflection off of water suspended in the air, but the wind moves and catches the light and then the shapes are made discernible. Two of them, sprouting from his shoulder blades, spreading wide and filling the air between them.

And Sam really, _really_ can’t help staring.

They’re the color of the horizon when the sun has gone but it hasn’t shifted into darkness yet, that strange lack of color when the reds and oranges of sunset have all burned away but the indigo has yet to seep in. Not white, but a pale absence that remembers blue and orange and red and all the rest and keeps them hidden, ghosted away just beneath a layer of ether.

The feathers shift against something, wind, perhaps, or something else too far away to understand. They are thin slivers of space, as if someone gathered scraps of cloth from the fabric of the sky and used them to piece together a tessellation in infinite layers, shifting and stretching as they are spread wide against the sunlight.

They are beautiful, and yet even as he thinks that the simplicity of the word seems undeserving.

But there is a discordance to them, as well. Breaks, little deviations from the design. They are small and barely noticeable, but as the slivers of light shift, hidden hairline fractures between them are starkly evident and Sam can almost feel the cold vacancy. It's hard to describe, like lost space, holes, cuts that are somewhere beyond the possibility of healing.

He hasn’t realized he has been moving closer until he sees his own hand lifted in the air in front of him, close enough to touch. He holds it still for a moment, watching with wide eyes and parted lips as the shadows of space shift against the light, catching the shape of feathers almost by accident, firmament peeled apart and stuck back together.

Sam fingers drift closer now and his skin dances hums with the proximity. Someplace deep in his chest warms, sighs, presses, easing his hand forward as if it knows it belongs there, needs it to belong there.

At last, his fingers connect with the edge of one outstretched wing and too many things happened at once.

A dancing thread of electric contentment leaps, shivering, up his arm, but in almost that same second the wings jolt, shocked and terrified, snapping and slipping against the air and scrambling between dimensions and out of immediate sight as Lucifer spins to face him.

The look on his face is something Sam has never seen, and he doesn’t just see the emotions written there, he feels them, in that strange place in the center of his chest that had known he would be standing up here. The impressions flow around him, a messy jumble of fear, confusion, joy, hope, all tangled up and shoving against Sam’s mind. 

It takes a lot not to gasp.

“What—?” Lucifer breathes, the feelings flare again: shock-terror-lost-how?

Sam tugs his hand back, letting the ghosts of foreign emotions fade away, realizing all at once exactly what he’s done, exactly what he’s touched. This was wrong, very, very wrong and in that instant, with shock in the blue eyes staring, horrified, back at him, all the calm of the morning shatters away.

“I didn’t mean…” Sam starts.

But Lucifer doesn’t seem to hear him, the confusion’s crawling over his face and ten other things seemed to be fighting for control as well.

“Did you…?” he barely manages.

Sam swallows, “I just… I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. They were just _there_ and, I don’t know, I guess I was curious.” He still can’t believe it, what the hell is wrong with him? “I’m sorry. I’m really, really sorry.”

Lucifer’s staring at him with furious concentration, “You can see them?”

Sam stares, and suddenly something connects in his mind, “… Can you?”

Lucifer looks away sharply, averting his gaze to the snow, brows tight and eyes wide, “I didn’t even think they were still there.”

Sam feels his throat going dry. Everything is clamoring for a place in his head but somehow all he can think about is the pulsing heat still lacing up his arm from the point where his fingers met the feathers.

Lucifer sighs and Sam realizes how exhausted he looks.

“What happened?” Sam asks quietly, “I fell in, and you pulled me out, but I was… you saved me. How did you save me?”

“I think,” Lucifer sighs, “I may have given you some of my grace.”

Sam’s chest flares warm and cold all at once. 

He knows that should shock him more than it does, he knows those strange impossible words should be terrifying him a lot more than they are, but somehow he had already known what he would say. Somehow he’s known since he lay lifeless on the floor and a voice asked him to take something that didn’t belong to him and he accepted it even though he knew he shouldn’t.

“You don’t know?” Sam asks. His voice is calm. He’s almost impressed by that, “I mean, you’re not sure?”

Lucifer shakes his head. “If you can see my…” He looks up and meets his eyes and Sam feels it again, that strange wash of emotions that he senses aren’t his and yet somehow belong to him all the same, “Sam, I didn’t even know I had any remaining grace at all.”

“But you felt… that.” Sam tries, gesturing stupidly at the empty space behind his back, “Just now, I mean.”

Lucifer almost laughs. “Yeah, I felt.”

Sam runs a hand through his hair and sighs, trying to make this line up right in his head. He tries to remember. He remembers the cold, he remembers drowning… he thinks he might remember dying. He’d thought he was dead. He’d been convinced. And then there had been the heat and the light and something else, too. Something much more impossible. A word not meant for him. A plea… no, not a plea…

“Did you pray for me?” Sam asks.

The questions hangs in the air between them, light and heavy at once, because, after all, there’s only one thing angels can pray to.

Sam feels emotions echoing around him but he can’t tell any more who they belong to.

Lucifer laughs, and it’s short but lacking in the usual bitter aftertaste.

“Apparently it worked.” He smiles at Sam. It’s broken on the edges, “That’s a first for me, you know.”

Sam can’t seem to help smiling back, “Maybe it’s not a last.”

There’s a hum in his chest, something warm through the fear, alive and welcome and he hopes Lucifer can feel it too.

“Come on,” Sam says quietly, “Let’s go home.”

 

He doesn’t know how many hours later it is when they finally settle back into the warmth of the house. The smell of soup is seeping off the stove as Lucifer shoves a few logs inside it and the firewood cracks appreciatively. 

Lucifer leans back in his chair, lacing his fingers behind his head. Sam pulls out a few bowls, the quiet sounds echoing around them. Outside the sky is growing darker, shadows slipping into longer shapes.

It feels comfortable. It feels right.

“How long was I out?” Sam asks before he can think about that for too much longer.

Lucifer shrugs. “A week?”

Sam turns, slightly incredulous. “Seriously?”

Lucifer nods, “Mmm, it was a very dull week.”

Sam eases himself over, setting down the bowls and sitting down into the other chair with a creak. He leans forward, resting his forearms on his knees and knitting his fingers together. He turns, a strand of hair falling out of place across his forehead.

“Did I… umm...”

“Die?” Lucifer finishes, drumming his fingers idly against his knees as he leans back. “Pretty sure.”

“And you…?”

Lucifer glares at him briefly, as if to suggest that if Sam brings up the whole _praying_ thing again he’s not going to be terribly happy.

“...Stopped it.” Sam finishes instead.

“Apparently,” Lucifer sighs, dropping his head back to stare at the ceiling.

Any normal personal would ask the only normal question next: _why?_ But Sam doesn’t ask. He thinks he knows, but it isn’t quite ready to be sure. He’s still mostly terrified of the answer.

“So… I have your grace now?” Sam asks.

“Some of it. I think. Ninety percent sure.” Lucifer says with a furrow of his brow.

Sam laughs. “What, you don’t know?”

Suddenly, Lucifer's expression turns serious. His voice is quieter when it answers him. “Sam, I didn’t even know I still had it to give. I didn’t know it was something I could give…”

Sam holds his gaze for a moment and then turns back to the fire. “Huh.”

Lucifer laughs suddenly.

Sam turns in surprise, “What?”

“Are you sure you’re alright?” Lucifer asks.

He shrugs by way of response. “Umm… I guess so. Mostly. Why?”

“Well… you’re not hitting me, or yelling accusations of malicious misdirection, or storming off into the snow, or trying to carve my grace out of your chest with a hunting knife…”

Sam leans back into the chair. “Yeah, guess not.”

Lucifer squints. “Why?”

Shifting to better to meet his gaze, Sam finds for a moment that he thinks he sees a short shimmer of something behind Lucifer, filtered through the back of the chair and catching the light of the fire in the right angles.

“I don’t know,” Sam says. “I just… I believe you. I know you’re not lying. I know you’re almost as lost about this as I am.”

“How can you be so sure?” Lucifer asks.

“I feel it,” Sam explains, at a loss for any better explanation.

Lucifer stares. “… Feel it?”

Rolling his shoulders, Sam eases back. “It’s just… it’s like an flicker. An impression. It’s hard to—“

“I understand.” Lucifer says instantly.

“You do?”

He nods, silent, blue eyes drifting back to the lapping flames of the fire.

Sam feels the heat of the stove against his knees the same as always. So much is the same, and yet none of it is. He’s calm in a way he hasn’t been in a long time. He’s not sure he understands it. He’s not sure he wants to try just yet. But it feels more like home tonight than it ever has before, and he knows he can ask him anything.

“Why did you pray for me?” Sam asks, voice quiet.

“Because I need you.” Lucifer says simply.

Sam looks at him, “Why?”

Lucifer turns to face him. His eyes feel lighter than they ever have, calm and bright and sharp.

“Because no one has ever looked at me the way you do.”

Sam holds his stare. It should feel strange, awkward, uncomfortable. But it doesn’t. Something is thrumming through his chest, wrapping easily around some place deep inside of him, warm and protective and present.

“You asked me something,” Sam says.

“I asked you lots of things.” Lucifer smiles.

“No,” Sam says, “The first thing… that first night. You asked me why, why I didn’t kill you.”

Lucifer’s stare is strong against his. The smell of the stove and the wood of the floor clusters around them.

“No one’s ever looked at me the way you do either,” Sam says, tone soft, caught up in the silence of the room, “When you look at me, it’s like I’m not broken, like I’ve never been… like you need me. Truly need me, in a way no one else has. For what I am, not despite it.”

Lucifer’s face is full of that look, the look from the broken mirror. But now Sam feels it as well as sees it, and it’s just what he always knew it would be.

“That’s why I didn’t kill you... I’m not sure I knew that then. But I do now.”

For a long time, Lucifer looks at him - or is it the other way round? Sam’s not sure he knows the difference any more. 

Sam has five bowls of soup before he’s full. It’s gamey and thick and perfect and by the time he’s done, Lucifer’s laughing his way through his third glass of bad scotch and Sam has to catch up fast.

The stove is casting long shadows across the floor by the time they stumble towards sleep. Sam hits the cot like a bag of rocks, realizes he’s taken it without asking and has just enough time to feel like a dick until Lucifer drags the sleeping bag over to the side of the cot. A soft blanket of comfort and contentment wafts over Sam from the inside out, pushing him back and into sleep with the sound of Lucifer’s steady, human breathing below and beside him.

 

There’s a sound against the dark. It’s soft, hardly a sound at all, but Sam _feels_ it. A short stab of panic pierces his chest and his eyes open. 

It’s dark all around him. The embers in the stove are low and dim, just outlining the familiar shapes of the cabin. The sensation slices into him again and Sam rolls, half asleep still, searching towards what he knows must be the source.

Lucifer’s on the floor below him, body sense and tight. Light shivers in the dark above his back and suddenly Sam’s far more awake.

A small frightened sound escapes Lucifer in his sleep and the wings beat slightly, weakly against the air, as if he's trying to escape a nightmare.

Sam watches for a moment, one hand under the pillow beneath his head, the other resting on the cot beside him. Lucifer twitches again, harder this time, the wings snapping short and tight and the stab of fear that lashes against Sam’s chest has his hand moving all on it’s own.

His fingers stop inches from the shivering shapes caught in the air, hold for a moment, and then as gently as he dares, he lets them sink in.

He almost gasps at the sensation but manages to swallow it, and god this was so not a good idea. Definitely the furthest thing from a good idea. 

It’s cool, light, and present against his fingers, like slivers of frozen air, but it’s soft as well, yielding and strange and incredible. 

Lucifer stills, not in the shocked manner he had up on the ledge, in an easy, calm, yielding way, body relaxing and pressing back down into the blankets under him even as the wings stretch slightly, hardly, pushing back into Sam’s hand just enough.

Sam stays very still. He knows he should pull his hand away, roll over and go back to sleep, but his heart’s suddenly thudding so hard he can hardly remember the hazy exhaustion he’d felt hardly a moment ago. He should stop, _right now_ , especially after the way he’d looked at him when he’d touched before. But that was just his problem wasn’t it? He’d always been great at _knowing_ what he shouldn’t do… but knowing and actually not doing were apparently two vastly different things.

And what makes it worse is that it doesn’t feel wrong, it feels strange, and about 90% terrifying and 10% comforting, but above all that it’s so new, so fascinating that he can’t seem to stop himself. The strange electric pulse of them doesn’t seem to want him to stop either. It almost feels like small silver threads of light and nearly ticklish pulses of heat and cool are snaking around his fingers gently where they rest against the feathers, if you could really even call them that.

He finds himself moving his hand, carefully, slowly, slipping his fingers along the seams and just slightly beneath to see how feathery they actually are. The sparks dance down the nerves of his arm to that strange new place in his chest with a sense of safety and contentment. They are like feathers really, cool and almost metallic on the edges but soft, too, sliding against his fingers one at a time, layered and eased together. The light of the fire catches on them differently as he moves his hand and the longer he stares at them the better he can see, like one of those strange optical illusions that’s total nonsense until you put your hand out and cover a bit of it and it snaps into something tangible in the right plane of your mind. 

They’re still the color they were outside, that pale white of the sky just before it decides to finally go dark, and the breaks… no, wounds, he realizes - they’re still visible, empty even against the orange light of the fire. It’s so strange, and he can’t help being totally consumed by it, watching how slipping his hand carefully up them, tilting the feathers just barely makes them sort of sift and flow together in and out of existence, filtering between dimensions like someone sliding filters over a screen.

He’s propped up on his elbow now, stretching to reach further, trying to see which angle brings them just right into focus, testing how adjusting the way his hand moves affects the tingling sensations that ease up his arm, wrapping around his fingers, slipping down his wrist, pulsing beneath his skin. 

The cool edges of feathers part under his hand, and Sam pauses for half a second, wondering, before tentatively letting his hand sink deeper. He pushes the feathers back slightly, searching deeper until his fingers meet something soft and warm that zings right through his chest with a shocked pulse.

He catches a gasp on his own lips and suddenly realizes he’s not sure exactly where the shock came from. He hears shallow breathing coming from the figure under him.

Instantly, he can feel his face heating up and he moves as if to pull his hand away, but Lucifer’s shoulders tense noticeably and the wings shift under him, the strings of sensation wrapped around his fingers tightening ever so slightly.

Sam swallows. His hand stays where it is, not pulling away but wary not to slip too deeply through the feathers again. He has the strong sensation that he’s standing on the edge of something he should step away from, that there’s a ledge under his feet that he’s dangerously close to tumbling over. It would only take a little push, and then he’d fall.

But no… that isn’t right. He’s falling already. He’s been falling for a while now.

Sam dives his hand in again, and the sensation that shoots through him knocks his breath out. It’s static and alive and suddenly so full of so much more, hope and desperation, joy and grief, fear and need and he hears something catch in Lucifer’s throat that he makes him swallow hard.

Lucifer’s awake. That much is obvious, and with that realization Sam thinks he really _really_ should stop _right fucking now_ , but the wings seem to hear him and suddenly they spread, opening wide and vast and Sam can’t help raking his hand up the full length of the one under his fingers.

Lucifer gasps against the floor and suddenly Sam notices the way he’s rolled so he’s on his stomach, hands balled tight against the musty old sleeping bag, forehead resting on his forearms as his back arches up to push the wings even further into Sam’s reach.

The emotions that are clamoring around Sam’s mind are full of shock and wonder and something deeper and warmer that Sam thinks he recognizes too well. He wonders if this, him touching like _this_ , makes Lucifer feel whole again. He wonders if only with his hands pushing deep and easing out and pressing down can he feel his wings at all. He wonders how long it’s been since anyone’s touched him like this. He wonders if anyone has ever touched him like this.

The response echoes clear enough through him, all static and desperation, and Sam finds himself needing to prove his presence, to show that he can touch, that he will.

He slips his hand in deeper than before and grabs firm and fast.

Lucifer’s controlled breathing cracks apart and a broken groan falls out of him, even as he grits his teeth against it as if to catch it there. But somehow that’s all Sam needs to send the sensation hot around him slamming home.

Suddenly he’s all too aware of all too much, the way his own breathing is shallow and quick, how dry and heavy his tongue is in his mouth, the pressing, all too present tightness against his jeans that pulses hard and unrelenting with each rhythmic movement of his hands.

But god he can’t help it, he really can’t help it. He slips his hand up and dives it back down again with deep strokes and Lucifer actually bucks back up into him, unable to cage the sound it drags from him between his teeth. He sounds like he’s trying to say something, Sam thinks it’s might be _“I’m sorry—“_

“Fuck,” Sam hears himself breathe. And god, _this is such a bad idea—_

He does it again, and again. His arm is going numb, he can feel threads of light pulsing hot and constant, beating a rhythm along with his pounding heartbeat 

Lucifer’s emotions are racing down his arm, throbbing deep in his chest, flooding his brain, and it’s nothing but: _please don’t stop._

And it’s the fear in that chant that does it, the absolute terror that Sam will stop, that he can’t possibly want to give this. It’s a frantic desire for reassurance that has Sam swearing through his teeth and shoving himself off the cot and onto the floor until he’s knelt over him, knees on either side of his hips, shoving his hands hard into the layers of feathers, taking as much as he can.

It’s the noise Lucifer makes then that has Sam girding the restrained weight of his cock against the curve of his ass, tightening his fingers even harder which really does nothing at all to help.

_“Fuck, fuck—“_

The pressure of the jeans against him is far, far better than it has any right to be and he’s not even certain anymore whose pleasure he’s feeling. He _is_ sure that there are lights behind his eyes that weren’t there before, that the heat and ice under his hands is far greater than it was and that Lucifer seems hardly able to take a breath without it shattering on his lips.

He pushes back against Sam with ferocity, as if he’s desperate to share something with him but can’t summon the mental acuity for anything other than thoughtless dirty shoves, fast and sloppy and hard. 

Sam can hardly think; he can feel feathers brushing across his face, catching slightly in his hair. He turns his head and drags his open mouth along them and that static lights up his mouth like nothing else as Lucifer lets out a stunned sound under him that quickly falls off into muttered words Sam doesn’t understand but _feels_ echoing all through him.

_Don’t stop, please, please Sam, don’t stop._

How could he stop? How could he possibly even come close? But god he is close, he’s so _so_ close, everything’s getting lost, he doesn’t quite know where he starts and ends anymore, can’t quite tell who’s gasping out curses and what language they’re in, can’t feel where his fingers end and the feathers begin.

But he has to know, he has to tell, so he tries to remember the presence of his hands, pushing them down as low as they can get and feeling the wings spread for him, wider and wider and suddenly Lucifer is sitting up, his back pressed tight against Sam’s chest, and that thing, that _grace_ inside Sam flutters, snatching out to whatever is left in Lucifer and wrapping them together. Sam’s face is in his hair, full of the smell of wood stove and electricity and that stupid musty coat. Sam can feel each breath shove through his chest, caught, waiting, desperate, and flailing on the edge with wild hard motions—

_Please—_

Sam gasps, tugging his hands up the length of the wings, dragging harder and longer and deeper and Lucifer comes undone with a hard shiver, shoving his hips back into the burning line of Sam’s cock as his eyes fly open, lips falling apart, voice lost on the pleasure, and Sam can’t take it.

He wraps one arm hard around Lucifer’s waist, arm half on burning skin and half on that stupid t-shirt. He holds on tight and snaps his hips up, driving himself against him. 

A broken groan cracks out of Lucifer and Sam’s other hand is shoving through the feathers fast and deep and desperate and Sam’s just gone. The wings are thrashing and beating, seemingly lifting Lucifer’s body just slightly higher to bring him down that much harder. Everything seems to swell impossibly larger and then crash.

He jerks hard, letting out a strangled breath as his head falls back and he feels himself coming against the tight fabric of his jeans with lights behind his eyes. He hears Lucifer gasp once and then he can’t tell the difference any longer. There’s nothing separating them, the sensation, the distance, all of it just one hot moment of brightness and he forgets how to breathe.

He doesn’t know how much time passes, but finally Lucifer sighs and the world slips back into focus. 

Sam can feel his eyes pressed shut, he can feel the way his arm is wrapped viciously tight around Lucifer’s waist. He knows his face is in his hair. For a long time there’s nothing but the sound of their breathing steadily, slowly, shifting back to normal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to Clara my BETA for some especially lovely edits this week <333
> 
> Alright guys! There's one part left, it's likely going to be a long one. This is usually when I take some time to go back and do a final edit on all the previous chapters, I also like to make some graphics and a mix for the story's conclusion. So if this update takes a bit longer, that's why.
> 
> As always you can track "Fortinbras Fics" on tumblr tags to see the updates when they come through and I'll link anything I make for the completed story here when it's done.
> 
> Thanks for reading so far!


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We met over a small  
> earthquake. Now, my knees
> 
> shake whenever  
> you come around
> 
> and I’ve noticed your hand  
> has a slight tremor.
> 
> \- “I Have Always Confused Desire With Apocalypse” by Daphne Gottlieb

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AND DONE! Wow guys thanks so much for all the support, comments, kudos, etc, it's been such a fun project! Let's end it with some goodies!
> 
> Listen to the Soundtrack: [[HERE]](http://8tracks.com/fortinbrasftw/how-to-fall)  
> Check out the graphic: [[HERE]](http://fortinbrasftw.tumblr.com/post/54641148056/how-to-fall-read-soundtrack-rating-m)
> 
>  
> 
> A big special thank you to [[suchanadorer]](http://archiveofourown.org/users/suchanadorer) for BETAing this last chapter <333

Sam wakes up slowly. There’s warmth wrapped around his body, light and easy, and it makes it a good deal harder than it should be to open his eyes. He’s slept hard, maybe harder than he’s ever slept before, and even now he can still feel small electric pulses inching up his body, like small differing parts of him have fallen asleep and are coming back to life one at a time.

He can hear Lucifer’s steady breathing, feel the heat of him pressed against his side. Still half drunk on exhaustion Sam rolls over, his face ending up full of scratchy blonde hair and the smell of the fireplace. He lets himself sigh into it once before making his body sit up.

It’s bright, sunlight drifting in through the windows and catching against the small particles of dust lazing through the air. Sam glances down at the sleeping body next to him. They’re both still dressed. He doesn’t really remember falling asleep. He remembers them falling apart, both breathing heavily, and he remembers they hadn’t said anything. They’d managed an attempt at cleanup but hardly a few minutes later they’d been back where they were, collapsed in exhaustion.

Sam hadn’t held him, hadn’t spoken to him, hadn’t really even looked at him. They’d just fallen together onto the floor and he must have been asleep before even thinking about anything else. Sam thinks he remembers a hand finding his somewhere in the dark.

Sam stands up, trying his best to move quietly and not disturb Lucifer where he’s sprawled out in the floor. Lucifer makes a small discontinued noise in his sleep and rolls over, tugging the blankets--still warm from Sam’s body --close to his chest.

Sam runs a hand through his hair once and then heads towards the shower. He doesn’t even start to think until his clothes are in a pile on the ground and the hot water’s steaming up the mirror in front of him.

He jumps in as soon as he can and groans as the heat slips down his body, plastering his hair to his face and neck and easing down his muscles with smooth constancy, the noise of the water clattering all around and muting away the rest of the world. His brain starts to wake up.

What was he doing?

He’s not sure he understands exactly what happened last night, but that was a poor excuse when it was pretty obvious what category it all fell under. Bizarre angelic connections and grace induced aphrodisiacs aside, there was no denying what it had been down at its most basic level. That’s the thing he felt he should be sick over but… wasn’t.

He didn’t feel sick, he didn’t feel awful. He felt calm, and almost good, and there was no way he could blame all of that on something stupid like “well, it had been a while…”

It was… different. And not just for supernatural reasons. It hadn’t felt wrong. It had felt really, stupidly right.

It had felt like belonging.

It had never been like that before. He’d never been intimate with anyone without something, anything being held back. At first he’d been the one keeping things hidden: all his past, his family, the damaged feeling inside that he had never quite been able to shake. He’d held all that back from all of them. And then it had been the other way around. He hadn’t hidden anything from Ruby, she’d known it all, but she’d held so much back from him, and even when he hadn’t known the details there was still a feeling that he’d never been able to shake when they were together.

But this hadn’t been like that. It hadn’t been like anything else ever. Lucifer had let Sam see him, really see him and Sam was suddenly realizing he’d done the same exact thing.

Last night had been accepting in a way that was totally alien to him and almost addicting. It had felt like remembering a dream he’s been having for years and never quite been able to catch hold of.

But now he’s remembered it and he doesn’t want to forget. Now, standing under the noise of the water and watching it slip down the metal drain under his feet, Sam comes to the thinks that he doesn’t want to let go of that feeling. Even now he can still feel the warm hum of grace present and constant inside his chest. 

He’s been standing in the shower for longer than he probably should have, he thinks as he turns off the faucet before he uses up all the heat and leaves Lucifer with only icy water.

Sam dresses quickly, scrubbing the water out of his hair roughly before swiping the threadbare towel across the mirror and leaning on the sink to stare back at his own face.

How long has it been since he found Lucifer standing in this exact spot, and Lucifer had stared back at him through a broken mirror? Weeks? Months? He hadn’t killed him… They hadn’t killed each other. Maybe this is what they had been heading towards, always, even if neither of them knew it. This place. These moments.

Sam suddenly finds himself thinking about that half-assed trip to heaven, stumbling through moments lost in time, little islands of secluded contentment and forgotten happiness. He wonders if, when he dies the young death he can’t deny he’s destined for, he’ll wake up with hardwood floors under him, the smell of wood stove all around and the feeling of a warm body next to him. A body with a face that smiles at him like he’s never been broken.

Maybe Lucifer would find a way back to heaven after all… 

A wooden crash explodes through the quiet of the cabin. 

Sam freezes in shock for half a second before spinning fast, ripping the door open, and running back out into the cabin. 

It takes him a minute to really understand what he’s seeing. Lucifer’s closest to him. He’s standing, the gun Sam taught him how to use hard against to his shoulder and pointed at the door.

The door which is now hanging off its hinges and filled with two figures, just visible with the bright sun at their backs.

Sam stares. “Dean?”

But Dean isn’t looking at his brother. He’s looking at Lucifer, his own pearl handled pistol tight in his hands and pointed dead at him.

“You alright, Sammy?” Dean’s eyes never leave Lucifer.

Sam’s heart has gone tight and terrified in his chest. He can see Castiel waiting just behind Dean, his shoulders tense and ready for anything that might happen.

“I’m fine,” Sam says, trying to keep his voice steady. “I’m fine, it’s alright, I promise, just put the gun down, please.”

Dean does look at him then, a small wrinkle set in his forehead, but it’s hardly for a second and then his attention is back on Lucifer.

“Him first,” Dean snaps.

Sam looks to Lucifer. For a second Sam thinks he’s shaking, and suddenly he feels a jolt of terror that slices through the humming warmth of the grace hidden there.

“Hey…” Sam take s a slow step towards Lucifer, trying his best to force reassurance into his voice.

Lucifer doesn’t take his eyes off of Dean, doesn’t flinch from his rigid stance, gun pointed and ready, but Sam knows he’s listening to him.

“Please,” Sam presses.

Lucifer’s fear thrums again, tight enough to almost hurt behind Sam’s ribs.

“He’ll shoot me. Again.” Lucifer says carefully.

He looks at Sam then and Sam feels a new emotion pulse against him, something tinted with the taste of the night before, full of hope and need and a searching sense of comfort. Sam can almost see the shape of wings, ready and fierce in the air behind Lucifer’s back.

“I don’t want to die, Sam.” Lucifer’s wings shudder, like shimmer of heat in the cool air of the cabin.

Sam can only imagine what’s going through Dean’s head right now but he doesn’t care.

“You won’t,” Sam says, holding Lucifer’s gaze furiously. “I promise.” Sam turns to Dean. “Right?”

Dean meets his eyes for a moment. His face is dark, carved in stone. Finally, he gives a short nod. Sam feels himself sigh, some of the tightness retreating from his limbs.

Sam looks back to Lucifer and smiles weakly. “Alright?”

Lucifer can’t seem to look away from his face. Slowly, he lowers the gun.

“Dean, wait—!“ Castiel yells.

Dean shoots.

Sam gasps - the pain that explodes in his chest is so unexpected that he thinks he’s going to collapse, but instead he’s moving forward, rushing toward Lucifer’s falling body.

Some part of his brain whispers that this isn’t happening, that this whole thing has been some strange dream and this is the end of it. He’s going to wake up and realize just how out of place and illogical all the pieces were. He’ll realize he was never eating soup with the devil or teaching him how to hold a gun in a moth eaten hunting jacket and boots that don’t fit right. He never held his hand in the dark and laughed about the beginning of the universe through shit whiskey and foggy memories. He never needed him. And Lucifer won’t really be here now, eyes turned like they should be looking at Sam’s but there’s a haze over them that makes that impossible as the deep red fills up the front of his shirt and he slips down to his knees almost gracefully before he collapses back onto the wooden floor.

Sam hits the ground so hard the pain echoes through his knees but he doesn’t notice it, not against the painful cold scrambling into his chest. He slips one hand under Lucifer’s head, gripping tight to the blonde hair that’s longer than it was when they first got there, eyes searching frantically down to his chest.

There’s a dark red circle right over the left side, little hiccups of blood pumping steadily out with each shallow breath. Sam presses his hand over the wound, trying to shove the blood back down in, but it simply seeps up through the cracks in his fingers dark and constant.

“Sam— it’s cold-“

Lucifer’s voice is strange, weaker.

Sam shakes his head. “Shut up. No it’s not. It’s fine.”

Sam’s throat is too warm and he tastes salt on his lips, but that can’t be right. Sam isn’t crying. He can’t be.

“Thank you –“ Lucifer manages.

Sam’s eyes find his. What he sees in them is not what he expected to find. There’s a quiet there he’s never seen before.

“For what?” Sam hears himself whisper. His voice is breaking but that doesn’t matter, nothing could possibly matter less in the face of the guilt and terror pouring through his chest that a small comforting warmth is trying to calm.

Lucifer smiles weakly, blue eyes bright. “For showing me how.”

Sam tries to say something but his voice sticks in his throat. The fragile smile drifts away from his lips and Lucifer’s eyes aren’t looking at him any longer, they aren’t looking at anything anymore. The warm pulses of blood under Sam’s hand have come to a stop.

Sam stares down in shocked horror. His chest is suddenly freezing cold and he doesn’t think he’s ever been so scared.

Dean’s voice is rough behind him. “Sammy? ”

Sam is turning with vicious speed, eyes ignoring Dean and locking right onto Castiel. “Fix him.”

He knows he’s gritting the words out through his teeth, he knows he must look terrifying, furious, and everything else but _god_ he doesn’t care.

“Fix him, Cas! Now!”

Castiel is staring at his face like he’s never seen him before, no... like there’s something there he’s never seen before.

“SAM!” Dean yells, and now Sam does look at him. 

He wishes he hadn’t. 

He’d imagined what his face would look like, but it was nothing like the cold dead rage he finds there. Dean stares into his face for a moment and then glances down. Sam follows his gaze. He wonders how long he’s been holding Lucifer’s hand.

“It doesn’t matter-“ The words flow out without permission. “It doesn’t matter, none of it, you have to fix him.”

“Sam-“ Castiel tries.

“What’s wrong with you!” Sam yells, “What are you waiting for? He’s dying!”

“He’s dead.” Castiel says as if he doesn’t quite believe it.

Sam wants to hit him. He wants to hit everyone. “No, he’s not, you can fix him.”

“I can’t Sam,” Castiel tries, “This place affects me… it’s—“

Sam’s on his feet in an instant, pushing past them. He grabs the side of the bookcase and sends it crashing to the ground. Ruby’s knife is still on the floor. It’s in his hand in a second and he’s slicing clean across the sigil carved there.

“Now-“ Sam says, “You can do it now.”

They both stare at him in silence.

Sam can feel his breathing catching in his chest. It’s burning, he knows, but somehow he’s still so cold.

“Please…” He whispers, “Just… please.”

Castiel stares at his face for a moment longer. Slowly he turns towards Lucifer’s body.

“Cas!” Dean warns, snatching a hand to his arm.

Castiel simply looks at him and carefully shrugs his hand away. “It’s my decision Dean. He’s my brother.”

Sam can feel a sob building his chest but he swallows it down, watching Castiel with wide frantic eyes.

Castiel kneels down carefully, and slowly he lays and hand down on Lucifer’s chest.

Sam feels a glow under his skin that suddenly flashes into brilliant heat and then there’s nothing but confusion and a dull sense of pain.

He lets out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding.

Suddenly Castiel’s head snaps to the side. “They’re coming.”

“What?” Dean follows his gaze up towards the ceiling, hand tightening on his gun again. “Who?”

“We have to go,” Castiel says sharply, wrapping an arm under Lucifer’s body and lifting him up. “Now!”

And just like that they are gone.

For an instant Sam thinks he feels snow under his feet, and sees the valley spanning out beneath him as if he’s standing on the hill, looking down on the lake and the trees. Somewhere through the hazy half vision he thinks he sees the cabin explode in light and fire.

And then he’s gasping, reaching out a hand to catch himself against rough motel wallpaper and breathing in the smell of air freshener and concealed mold.

He looks around. They’re in a motel room, small, dingy, familiar in the way they all are. The curtains are drawn and thin grey light in filtering in between them. Dean is a few feet away from him, trying to catch his breath against the small table by the window. Across the room Castiel is laying Lucifer down on one of the beds. Sam can’t help noticing a wince flit across Lucifer’s face and feels a wave of relief pour through him. He can’t help the smile that’s flooding his face. 

He watches Castiel press a finger against Lucifer’s forehead briefly and feels heat snake over his ribs.

Dean takes exactly two seconds to breathe before the fury is carved back onto his face. “Alright, who’s going to tell me exactly what the fuck is going on here?”

Castiel eases himself around the edge of the beds. His hair looks a little more wild than usual and Sam could almost say he seems exhausted, “Michael saw us. That sigil was keeping that place hidden and when Sam broke it they could see. It was very advanced and particular work. I understand now why I couldn’t find your location, Sam.”

“They found us?” Sam asks. “That fast?”

“We aren’t the only ones who’ve been searching.” Castiel says. “Lucifer’s been gone for almost two months without a trace.”

“Yeah, and since when does he die?” Dean yells, pointing angrily at the prone figure collapsed on the ugly floral print of the motel bed.

“He’s human… mostly.” Castiel says.

“The spell worked, sort of.” Sam adds. His chest still bouncing with adrenaline but he tries to calm it.

Dean won’t look at him. He guesses he expected that.

“What do you mean ‘mostly’?” Dean presses Cas.

Castiel looks at Sam. His gaze drifts over Sam carefully, but his eyes narrow when they slip down to his chest. He looks back to his face, “What happened, Sam?”

Sam catches half a laugh in his throat. He’s exhausted but there’s such a powerful relief still clinging to him he can’t help it. In a way he’s glad, maybe Castiel will finally have the answers. “You tell me.” 

“What the hell are you talking about?” Dean says.

Castiel doesn’t take his eyes from Sam. “He has some of Lucifer’s grace.”

The room goes very quiet for a moment before Dean breaks the silence, looking from Sam to Castiel and back.

“…Excuse me?” 

“I don’t know how,” Castiel says, turning back towards the bed to inspect Lucifer more closely. “I’ve never heard of such a thing being possible, but apparently it is.”

“I was dying,” Sam hears himself say. His voice sounds huge in the tiny motel room after so much time in the open space of the cabin. “Dead… actually. He saved me.”

“Of course he did,” Dean snaps suddenly. “Can’t lose his precious apocalypse action figure!”

“It wasn’t like that,” Sam replies angrily.

“No,” Castiel agrees, “It wasn’t.”

Sam turns to look at Lucifer on the motel bed. His shirt’s still soaked in blood but he seems to be asleep now. The gentle rise and fall of his chest is reassuring, and Sam can feel a warm hum inside him again, that terrifying chill that had been there so strongly before easing away into nothing.

“He said he didn’t even know he had it any longer.”

“He shouldn’t,” Castiel agrees. “I can see the spell, it’s… impressive. His grace is locked in powerful magic that seems for all purposes irreversible. It should have been completely inaccessible to him.”

“It was,” Sam confesses. “He, umm … He prayed.”

Castiel’s attention shoots up.

Sam can feel Dean’s disbelieving stare. “To… God?!”

Sam looks down. “Yeah, I think so.”

Castiel is frowning and his forehead as a tight line written in it. “He asked God to save you…”

“Or to let him save me?” Sam supplies. “I think that’s how it actually worked out.”

“So what? God let him give you his grace?” Dean stares. “In what fucking universe does any of that make sense?”

Castiel is staring at the carpet under them. “Perhaps that’s the acceptance our Father has been waiting for from him?”

Dean shakes his head before abruptly starting to pace back and forth. “Alright, grace or not, god or not, it’s _Lucifer_ and we are getting whatever he shoved into Sam out of there and dealing with this-“

“I don’t think that will be possible,” Castiel says.

“Yeah? And why fucking not?” Dean shoots.

Castiel looks at Sam before turning his attention back to Dean. “Sam accepted it… It was his choice. It’s bound to him now in a million ways nothing could possibly unravel.”

Dean looks at Sam as if he’s wearing some else’s face before shaking his head and turning away, arms behind his head, body tense.

Sam lets the silence hang for a few minutes. Cas’ words are still settling around him. 

It’s real… the grace, the intention, all of it. It still feels like some weird dream he’s not quite woken up from, but here’s Cas standing there telling him everything he’s suspected- if he’s totally honest with himself - everything he’s hoped for. And it’s God’s Will, it seems, whatever that hell that means, and, he thinks, maybe that sense of _right_ in all of it, that feeling of belonging wasn’t so misplaced after all. 

They’re bound to each other, that’s what Cas had said. It should be terrifying, horrifying, and Dean’s right, he should want to rip it out. But he doesn’t. Somehow it doesn’t feel like something new, something intrusive. It feels like just noticing something that’s always been there. Like the wings, slipping between realities and just visible on the edges. It’s familiar, like he’s always had it, only now he can see all it’s colors.

“Is he…?” Sam finally asks, nodding his head towards the bed.

“He should be fine after he’s rested,” Castiel says. “I’ve hidden him as I hid you.”

Dean shakes his head and turns towards the door. He snatches at the handle to tug it open but Sam finds himself moving without thinking to stop him.

“Wait-“

And to his shock Dean actually does.

He turns back to Sam and he’s pissed, beyond pissed, furious, but there’s a confusion there too, something that wants to understand.

“Can we talk about this?” Sam asks.

Dean holds his gaze for a minute and then shakes his head, “I don’t know, Sam.”

“Please,” Sam says quietly.

Dean looks back at the door. His hand tightens on the knob but he doesn’t leave and after a moment he nods curtly.

———

They end up outside by the Impala. It’s still cold, even if this place is apparently a few hundred miles south of where he’s been. There’s only about two or three inches of snow left on the ground instead of a few feet, but the wind is chilly and Sam finds himself pulling his coat a little closer against it.

It’s been seven weeks since the spell.

Apparently this was the last place Dean and Castiel had stayed, leaving the car in some dead end town as far north as they could get before the roads stopped and they had to start venturing out into the wilderness on their own to circle around in an attempt to stumble on them. Sam’s only now starting to notice how exhausted Dean seems as he fills Sam in on the details of their search. It had been a combination of snow mobiles, hiking, and Castiel zapping wherever he could that had finally let them close in on the cabin. 

Sam can’t deny a certain amount of guilt there, especially now knowing he could have shortened that search but by what? A day? He won’t dwell on that, even if the worry and stress seeping off Dean in waves is making that harder than it should be.

“Is that why you wanted to save him?” Dean asks, Sam notices he still can’t quite look at him. “Because he saved you?”

“Partly,” Sam reflects. “But mostly, I just didn’t want him to die.”

Dean shifts as if this entire thing makes him viciously uncomfortable but he’s trying his best to understand it. “So what? You get trapped in some cabin with the guy for a few weeks and now you’re joined at the hip? Do I have to tell you how fucked up that sounds, Sammy?”

Sam laughs. “No, you really don’t.”

Dean looks at him like he really shouldn’t be laughing so Sam stops. 

“What the hell happened up there?” Dean asks, stare sharp. “What could have possibly happened to make you trust him this much this quickly? What did he do to you?”

Sam shakes his head. “Nothing.”

“Nothing?” Dean’s says, tone dripping disbelief. “Come on, Sammy… you’re here now, you’re with us. Did he hurt you? Threaten you?”

“No,” Sam insists, looking at Dean seriously. “Well, he hit me a couple of times when I said yes and he couldn’t do anything about it--”

“You did _what_?!” Dean yells.

“I said yes,” Sam says, calm in the face of Dean’s rage. “Because I knew he wouldn’t be able to do anything, and he didn’t. I had to be sure.”

“That was really stupid Sammy, _really_ fucking stupid—“

“No,” Sam insists. “It wasn’t. I’m fine, and I had to know he wasn’t lying. I had to know it wasn’t a trick. Was there a better way to do that?”

Dean shakes his head but doesn’t answer.

“He didn’t brainwash me. He didn’t manipulate me. We just… talked.” Sam says.

“Yeah, I hear he’s pretty good at that,” Dean snaps.

“I just asked him questions, and he told me the truth.” Sam insists. “He didn’t hurt me, and it’s not that he couldn’t have. He had plenty of chances to, but he didn’t. He just talked to me, asked me things.”

“About what?”

“About us, about the world.”

“Yeah and why the fuck does he care?”

“That’s just it though,” Sam says, “Don’t you see? He did care, he asked about so many things Dean. He wants to learn, wants to understand, and he realizes now that we’re not what he thought we were. We make our own fate, and that’s something he can relate to.”

Sam turns his head up towards the sky. “I think that’s why God let him save me… I think he wants us to help him understand.”

“What’s the plan here?” Dean sighs. He looks so tired suddenly it hurts Sam to see it. “You must have one, right? So what is it? What could it possibly be to make you this damn calm?”

“He stays with us,” Sam says. It’s the most obvious thing in the world. Of course it’s the answer.

Dean snorts out a bitter laugh. “Just like that?”

Sam nods. “Just like that.”

“So what? He piles in the back of Baby with Cas like we run some fallen angel preschool, and we show him It’s A Wonderful Life on Christmas and teach him how to be a ‘decent human being’ and just ignore the fact that Michael is ripping up the world behind us to get his fingers around his throat? Do we ignore that two months ago he was ready to burn you inside out to watch the world go up in flames?”

Sam doesn’t have anything to say to that, so he stays quiet. He’s not sure why he knows none of that is true any longer. He just does, he _feels_ it, and that’s something he can’t quite explain.

“We broke him, Dean,” Sam says finally. “He fell, but he trusts me. You saw that. I think it’s the only thing he has any more…”

“And how do you know he’s not going to rip apart that spell the first chance he gets?”

“I honestly don’t,” Sam says. “But I know he won’t hurt me. And I think he knows now that that means much more than he thought it did. Not hurting me means keeping you, and Cas, and Bobby, keeping day time TV and Biggersons, and everything else that comes along with the world.”

The wind catches around them, still chilled from winter but full of the promise of spring.

“You have to trust me, Dean.”

Dean shakes his head and lolls it back, staring up at the sky like mystical answers might just rain down onto him but he sincerely doubts it.

“You don’t make it easy, you know that, right?” Dean talks, but he doesn’t turn his head to look at Sam. “You don’t have the best track record here.”

Sam lets himself smile. “Yeah, I know.”

“Then why the hell should I even be remotely okay with this?” Dean asks quietly, and something in his voice suggests he’s truly hungry for an answer.

“Because,” Sam says, “you have to start having faith in me again. You have to start sometime or else we’ll just fall apart. We’ll slip away, and before we know it, we’ll be them.”

Dean sighs, dropping his head back to earth and leaning deeper against the Impala. “This is just so huge… It’s massive, Sammy.”

“I know,” Sam says. “I really do, but that doesn’t make it any different. You either trust me, or you don’t. There’s not much else to it.”

Dean shakes his head. “You have no idea how much it creeps me out to know there’s a part of him, _that_ part of him inside you.”

“It was my choice Dean, and I know it was the right one.”

Dean’s suddenly looking at him. “You’ve said that before.”

Sam knows that should slice through him, but it doesn’t. 

“Not like this,” he says. “Never like this.”

Dean stares down at his boots where they rest on a thin layer of snow, yellow brown grass poking up from the dirt underneath.

“I want to trust you, man, I want to so badly…”

“Then do,” Sam says, hating how much need slips into his voice. “Just do.”

Dean furrows his brow and, finally, he nods in silence. He pulls his eyes back up, meeting Sam’s with a weak smile.

“Yeah… alright.”

Sam can’t help smiling back, but Dean’s eyes are still tight on his.

“Just please,” Dean says, voice quiet and eyes almost gleaming. “Please don’t fuck this up, Sammy.”

Sam holds his gaze. “I won’t.”

“And if he tries one thing, even gets close to trying one thing I swear I will shoot him again and this time he won’t get up.”

Sam nods, “I know.”

“Alright.” Dean says finally.

“Alright.” Sam agrees.

And suddenly the air around them feels ten times lighter than it ever has. He doesn’t really know why but it’s as if there’s been a weight there he’s known about but never seen and now that it’s gone everything seems brighter, easier, better.

Dean smiles as if he feels it too. “But if he starts wearing your clothes I’m going to get seriously freaked out.”

“So will, I,” Sam laughs. “Anyways, is there a better way to keep an eye on him than in the Impala’s rearview mirror?”

“Only a few hundred,” Dean says instantly.

Sam smiles back, “Fair enough.”

 

— — — 

It’s late. Sam’s sitting on the back of the Impala with a well missed beer in one hand looking up at the stars. Dean and Castiel zapped to Bobby’s about an hour ago to tell him what they could, and to find out if he knows any hunters from northern Canada with a serious case of angel anxiety who they might owe a cabin and a month’s supply of canned goods, not to mention a beer or two for inadvertently saving the world. They’ll probably be gone a bit longer at least. 

Sam wanted to go with them but knew someone should stay here, at least until Lucifer wakes up, and Castiel said he didn’t want to move him just yet to avoid drawing attention. He’ll see Bobby soon enough. He’s shocked at how ready he is to smell the old books and dried booze of the place again.

He pulls the cool glass of the bottle up to his lips and takes a long sip, gazing up at the sky. It’s amazing how much brighter the stars seem. He feels like he sees twice as many as he ever has before and wonders if that’s going to be a permanent thing.

He hears the motel door open behind him but he doesn’t need to turn. His chest gives a small thrum of warmth that sinks deep as he feels Lucifer carefully step closer and then slip to sit on the car beside him.

Lucifer’s gaze follows Sam’s up to the night sky. “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” Lucifer asks. “The universe.”

“Mmm,” Sam agrees, watching as the distant white lights pulse against the black, impossible amounts of life fading out, fading in, and slipping through existence all around them.

Lucifer is quiet for a moment.

“You know, being shot really is as unpleasant as humans make it out to be.”

Sam laughs shortly. “Yeah, and being stabbed isn’t all that awesome either.”

They sit in silence, eyes tracing the sky overhead.

“Sorry Dean shot you,” Sam says finally.

“I knew he would.”

Sam looks at him in surprise, “Then why—?”

“You asked me to,” Lucifer says quietly.

Sam feels tightness in his throat. He stretches his fingers out, slipping around where he finds Lucifer’s hand resting on the cold metal of the Impala. They knit around his, skin rough and warm. Sam feels that same sense of belonging purr through him gently.

“Michael found the cabin,” Lucifer says.

Sam nods. “Yeah… I think it exploded.”

Lucifer frowns. “That’s too bad. I liked it there.”

Sam holds his hand a little tighter. “I know.”

“I’d never had a home like that before,” Lucifer says after a moment.

Sam feels the chill of the wind catch up around his hair as he turns to look at him. “You’re home now.”

Lucifer shakes his head. “Sam… Michael will find me.”

“We won’t let him,” Sam says.

“He’ll find me, and he’ll destroy everything in his path,” Lucifer says, and Sam feels the terror of that flash through him, and a deep grief beyond it all. “I have to go,” Lucifer whispers.

Sam moves slowly, letting one hand slip along the side of Lucifer’s jaw to pull him close. He leans his head just a few inches down to brush their lips together.

Lucifer’s lips are warm and rough, and suddenly Sam feels the sense of something wrapping around them, something just visible shimmering through the air – feathers slipping around his shoulders and holding him close. 

Sam leans his forehead against Lucifer’s, catching his breath on his own, “No. You don’t.”

He kisses him again with as much promise as he can. He feels Lucifer’s eyes fall shut, lips parting slightly to slip against his and they fit so perfectly it almost hurts.

“Stay,” Sam whispers, asks, insists, he’s not sure which.

Lucifer’s head barely nods against his, but Sam feels it inside him and around him, a promise that he isn’t going anywhere.

“I thought you didn’t want to catch me, Sam,” Lucifer says quietly, the warmth of his words misting in the air between them.

“Neither did I,” Sam feels himself smile. “I didn’t think I’d fall either. But I have, and I’m not sorry.”

Around him he feels the wings tighten, urging as close to him as they can get, those small strands of electric emotion slipping through his chest up all around them, full of comfort and belonging and _home_. 

He kisses him again, open and warm, and Sam knows with strange but constant certainly that he’s never, ever letting go.


End file.
